Gm.
LooksRare has been live for close to a month now, and in accordance with the schedule, Phase 1 of the LOOKS token emissions will soon come to an end, with Phase 2 starting at block 14172012 (currently Feb 9th, 12:21pm UTC at the time of writing).
In addition to the above, there will also be an update to the LP staking rewards.
We wanted to make sure everyone knows exactly what is changing, and things you should know.
This article will be relevant to you if you’re:
- An NFT trader on LooksRare
- Staking LOOKS on LooksRare
- Staking UniSwap LOOKS-ETH V2 LP Tokens
Jump to:
Changes to Trading Rewards and Staking Rewards
What’s going to happen?
At block 14172012, the amount of LOOKS emitted will reduce from 800 LOOKS per block to 380 LOOKS per block. This means:
- Trading rewards will reduce from 441.00 → 209.475 LOOKS per block.
- LOOKS staking rewards will reduce from 189.00 → 89.775 LOOKS per block.
Phase 2 emissions of 380 LOOKS per block will run for 585,000 blocks (~3 months) until block 14757012, after which another emissions reduction will occur for Phase 3.
Why does this matter?
- For traders, the specific dates of the changes for trading rewards are:
- The final day of Phase 1 trading rewards (2,866,500 LOOKS per day) will be recording volume completed between 2022/02/08 9:00 AM and 2022/02/09 9:00 AM (UTC), with the trading rewards able to be claimed at 2022/02/09 11:00 AM (UTC).
- The first day of Phase 2 trading rewards (1,361,587.5 LOOKS per day) will be recording volume completed between 2022/02/09 9:00 AM and 2022/02/10 9:00 AM (UTC), with the trading rewards able to be claimed at 2022/02/10 11:00 AM (UTC).
- For LOOKS stakers:
- The amount of LOOKS earned per block will reduce from 189.00 → 89.7750 LOOKS at exactly block 14172012.
How might WETH rewards be affected?
A particular point of concern from the community has been the amount of WETH rewards in relation to the trading rewards change.
👌 100% of platform fees (WETH) will continue to be earned by LOOKS Stakers.
The amount of WETH earned will continue to be based on daily trading volume every 6,500 blocks, which is affected by multiple factors such as the amount of trading rewards per block and the price of LOOKS.
While the number of LOOKS tokens as rewards has been reduced, the actual value of those LOOKS will continue to fluctuate each day, and it isn’t impossible to achieve the same value of rewards with a lower number of LOOKS tokens as trading rewards. It’s also true that a higher number of LOOKS rewards could have a lower actual value at the time vs a lower number of LOOKS rewards and a higher LOOKS price.
Changes to LP Staking Rewards
TLDR: In order to avoid a drop-off in liquidity for the LOOKS-ETH trading pair, we’re reallocating the LOOKS from the LP staking reward program towards long-term Uniswap V3 liquidity. LOOKS-ETH LP token stakers will no longer receive bonus LOOKS rewards starting from 2022/02/15, 10:15 AM (UTC).
Background and Issue to Resolve
At launch, LooksRare introduced a rewards program for LOOKS-ETH liquidity providers on Uniswap V2, where staking UniV2 LP tokens on LooksRare earns you additional LOOKS. This has resulted in a significant amount of liquidity provided for the LOOKS token, with around $26M on Uniswap V2 at this very moment.
This has been a great start, but as the market for LOOKS has matured, we’ve realized that rewarding LOOKS tokens for liquidity isn’t a sustainable long term strategy, and a more robust solution is required.
If we continue following the original rewards program, the LOOKS tokens used to incentivize liquidity will run out in just 37 days from today. And once those incentives run out, it's highly likely that liquidity providers will remove most or all $26M of the ETH-LOOKS UniV2 liquidity.
Reallocation of LOOKS Token Liquidity Rewards
To prevent a potential large drop in V2 liquidity and to ensure healthy liquidity for the LOOKS token going forward:
- We will be discontinuing the Liquidity Rewards Program at Ethereum Block 14211012 on Day 37 (Approximately 2022/02/15, 10:15 AM (UTC)), leaving 2,660,000 LOOKS to reallocate to V3.
- We’ll reallocate the leftover tokens to pair with ETH to add as V3 liquidity ourselves. The ETH for the LP will come from directly from our Treasury.
- We will keep this V3 liquidity in place for the foreseeable future, ensuring high liquidity for the LOOKS token over a long period time.
- Besides preventing a massive drop in liquidity, Uniswap V3 liquidity is much more capital efficient than V2, so you’ll likely experience lower slippage on Uniswap.
- In addition, the LP fees earned from the newly added Uniswap V3 liquidity be re-invested back into the position and will continue growing, meaning that liquidity in the pool should in fact increase over time.
We’re giving all LP token stakers a one-week heads up before implementing the change to give you enough time to reassess your positions going forward.
If you haven’t unstaked your LP tokens by the time rewards end, don’t sweat. The pool will be open and available on the Rewards page for everyone to withdraw from for the foreseeable future.
We understand that this may be an inconvenience for those who provided liquidity for the sake of earning LP rewards on a longer timeframe, but we are confident that this change is for the best of both the project and LOOKS holders/traders long-term.
The LOOKS tokens that are used for this liquidity incentivization represent a small portion of the Liquidity Management part of the Initial LOOKS Allocation, and have always been included in the circulating token supply. This update will not change the supply or the original token distribution.
As always, we welcome any and all feedback on this post, and on the changes.
Join our Discord and let us know what you think.
LooksRare 👀💎
