Proposal to invest $12 million worth of Uniswap tokens in Ekubo gets initial victory

Uniswap DAO has approved a temperature check proposal seeking to invest 3 million UNI tokens ($12 million) into the decentralized exchange Ekubo. The proposal, which was passed over the weekend, hints at a possible future investment from Uniswap in Ekubo in exchange for a 20% share of a potential governance token.

Founded by Moody Salem, a former engineer lead and Advisor on the Uniswap Labs team, Ekubo touts itself as an Automated Market Maker (AMM) on Starknet with a “singleton design, super-concentrated liquidity and support for extensions.”

Salem, in his proposal, noted that the investment was “a vitally important step in the decentralization of Uniswap protocol development, effectively onboarding the Ekubo team as core developers.” However, his claims were refuted by some members of the DAO due to the significant amount of investment that was being requested.

The co-founder at StableLab, Doo Wan Nam, voiced his sentiments: “If this proposal is passed, I think the Uniswap governance should seriously reflect on what is the role of governance and accountability.” Similarly, crypto market making firm Wintermute kicked against the proposal due to Ekubo’s implied $60 million token valuation.

In its current state, we cannot support this proposal based on the requested funding amount of $12M and the implied valuation of $60M […] There is little to no information about the Ekubo token, its intended use outside of a governance token, plans for the remaining 80% of the token supply, etc.

The Snapshot voting round received 21 million UNI tokens in support of the proposal and 12 million against it. The round saw more than 3,500 votes, suggesting a high interest by the Uniswap community in the proposal.