Gnosis DAO faces a massive treasury redemption proposal, "The Treasury Plunderer" returns again

Original Title: 「RFV Raiders」targets Gnosis DAO for a treasury redemption proposal

Original Source: Protos
Original Compilation: Chopper, Foresight News

A group of aggressive investors (or, in other words, “treasury plunderers”) are launching a treasury redemption plan proposal targeting holders of GNO tokens.

GIP-150 proposes a one-time, voluntary, and proportional treasury redemption program. If the proposal passes, supporting holders will share a portion of the over $220 million in reserve funds in the Gnosis DAO treasury proportionally.

This proposal is less than six months away from the Gnosis DAO vote to remove the former treasury manager, KPK. The proposer, Wismerhill, said that the market price of GNO tokens has long been trading at a discount compared with the Gnosis DAO treasury’s net asset value, and that the discount is still widening.

He added that although the DAO recently allocated $22.5 million to Gnosis Ltd, the token’s discount versus net assets has instead widened further, and the value upside GNO can capture is negligible.

The voting on the proposal is now open, with a deadline of May 12. Although support votes initially led by a large margin, among the 330,000 ballots already cast, 65% are voting against.

The redemption amount will be calculated proportionally based on 1.3 million eligible GNO tokens; tokens held by Gnosis Ltd are not included in the redemption scope. The rationale given in the proposal is that the entity has long been supported by DAO funds.

Based on this calculation, the redemption value per token is approximately $170—nearly 30% higher than GNO’s current market price of $131.

Reactions from various parties in the DeFi community

DeFi commentator and GNO holder Ignas admitted, “The RFV logic does have some merit,” but also pointed out, “This is purely an arbitrage transaction—there’s basically nothing righteous or principled about it.” He himself has cast a vote against. (Note: RFV is short for risk-free value, meaning risk-free value.)

ivangbi, head of DeFi at the Ethereum Foundation, also holds a similar view. Since Gnosis has never publicly marketed the treasury assets as a backstop for token prices, holders have no legitimate moral claim to divide the treasury.

There are also many people who are mindful of the contributions Gnosis has made to the industry ecosystem and do not agree with this proposal. Gnosis has core infrastructure projects under its umbrella, including Safe, CoW Swap, Gnosis Pay, and Gnosis Chain.

Gnosis founder Sebastian Bürgel said bluntly, “When did the most respected ecosystem builder in the industry become a target for hedge funds to harvest?” Nick Almond, head of the Jito ecosystem, directly labeled the proposal as a naked treasury dumping-and-escaping behavior.

Anthony Leutenegger, a representative from the Aragon team that was targeted by similar forces in 2023, offered a more moderate and rational perspective. He called on the industry to improve programmatic token-holder rights mechanisms, so as to better coordinate incentives among all parties and defuse disputes like this.

Past RFV targeting/snipe cases

In 2023, this group repeatedly launched similar treasury arbitrage actions, and the industry therefore tagged them as “RFV Raiders.” However, the group does not recognize this label.

The projects targeted back then included Rook, FEI/Tribe, and Aragon. Among them, Aragon was ultimately forced to adjust the use of its treasury funds and convert them into an ecosystem donation and grant program.

Not long ago, after Beefy Finance’s BIFI token fell below its treasury net asset value in April, the DAO quickly rolled out a buyback mechanism—precisely to avoid an RFV group’s surprise arbitrage raid.

As for this Gnosis incident, the proposal’s initiator, Wismerhill, had previously stated that he had long admired Gnosis DAO and even predicted that after the removal of KPK, Gnosis would make more decisions oriented toward commercial interests.

Right now, this vote will ultimately test whether GNO holders care more about short-term commercial arbitrage gains or the value of long-term ecosystem building.

Original Link

Click to learn about the job openings at Lyding BlockBeats

Welcome to join the official BlockBeats community:

Telegram Subscription Group: https://t.me/theblockbeats

Telegram Group Chat: https://t.me/BlockBeats_App

Twitter Official Account: https://twitter.com/BlockBeatsAsia