Olympus v2

Olympus is a protocol for algorithmic currency that aims to establish itself as a stable, crypto-native currency. While it's sometimes referred to as an algorithmic stablecoin, it's more comparable to a central bank because it utilizes reserve assets such as DAI to regulate its price. The protocol's objective is to maintain price stability while allowing the market to determine its value. Unlike stablecoins like USDC, OHM is supported by assets but is not tied to a fixed price. Technically, the baseline price for OHM is 1 DAI, but a premium and the value of the treasury contribute to its actual market price. OHM sets itself apart from other algorithmic stablecoins like Ampleforth (AMPL) by issuing OHM to acquire DAI and other assets, which helps maintain its treasury. This is somewhat similar to FEI, but unlike FEI, OHM is not pegged to a dollar value, allowing its price to fluctuate.

Olympus operates as a DAO, meaning it's managed by the community in a completely decentralized way via smart contracts. The protocol was launched by a group of anonymous individuals using pseudonyms such as "Zeus," "Apollo," "Unbanksy," and "Wartul."

According to GitHub, the main contributors to the codebase have been "Zeus" and Jeff Extor. There are rumors that Zeus might be a teenager who has captured the community's attention with his engaging charisma. Before its official launch, Olympus had a few private supporters, including Zee Prime Capital, Nascent, D64 Ventures, Maven11 Capital, and several unnamed investors.

Olympus is viewed as an intriguing economic experiment within the DeFi sector for several reasons. It owns a treasury that mints and sells new OHM whenever the price exceeds 1 DAI and repurchases and burns OHM when it falls below this threshold. The issuance of OHM is done through a process called bonding, where users exchange assets like FRAX, DAI, or wETH with the treasury for OHM at a discount. Users can also provide FRAX-OHM or DAI-OHM liquidity to the SushiSwap pool in exchange for discounted OHM. Bonds are redeemed after a five-day vesting period.

Users have the option to stake OHM, which lowers the available supply, thus adding value to the protocol. The staking rewards on Olympus are notably high, currently offering over 7,000% APY, a decrease from over 100,000% when the protocol began. These rewards are automatically compounded every eight hours. The system's aim is to incentivize users to accumulate more OHM, rather than merely hoping for its value to rise in USD terms. The protocol acknowledges that the dollar value of OHM could, and perhaps should, decrease over time. However, this aggressive accumulation strategy is intended to increase the protocol's market cap and boost the treasury.

Initially, Olympus didn't have much utility apart from enhancing its treasury, but it recently announced Olympus Pro, which aims to offer bond services to selected partners, helping them increase their own treasuries without the need for "mercenary capital" from liquidity pools.

Additionally, Olympus is famous for its effective marketing and meme strategies, contributing to a lively community presence. It popularized the "3,3" meme, illustrating that staking with the protocol is beneficial for all parties involved. This has become a widespread trend alongside the .eth addresses on Twitter.

With the design of a currency that floats freely, the total supply of OHM is unlimited. At present, more than 1.7 billion OHM tokens are staked within the network. Before the "Initial Discord Launch," which allowed early non-US participants of the Olympus Discord channel to join in a private sale, the team distributed pOHM, a derivative of OHM. This allows the team to mint OHM for each pOHM, which is then burned. The vesting breakdown is as follows:

Team: 330 million pOHM and 7.8% of the supply

Investors: 70 million pOHM and 3% of the supply

Advisors: 50 million pOHM and 1% of the supply

Holders of pOHM complete vesting anywhere between two and five billion OHM, providing them with a strong incentive to support protocol growth.

OHM is an ERC-20 token operating on the Ethereum network. The system is managed as a DAO and regularly features new Olympus Improvement Proposals (OIPs).

The ERC-20 standard is what most new tokens adhere to when launching on the Ethereum blockchain. Ethereum is a leading blockchain for DAOs and is protected by a proof-of-work consensus mechanism, involving miners who generate new Ether. A network of decentralized nodes validates transactions, ensuring the security of the Ethereum blockchain.

Olympus held its presale from March 12 to March 14, 2021.

You can purchase OHM on UniSwapV2 and SushiSwap.