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Neptune Mutual to Close Cover Marketplaces

5 min read
Neptune Mutual Final

After much deliberation and careful thought Neptune Mutual decided to close the cover marketplaces.

After much deliberation and careful thought Neptune Mutual decided to close the cover marketplaces. Below the reasons for the decision as well as what it means for the community.

The marketplaces will be closed using an emergency withdrawal process whereby the liquidity provided to cover pools by LPs will be returned to the wallet addresses from which the liquidity was supplied. In addition to protecting cover pool LPs, there will also be refunds to all cover policy purchasers with an existing and valid policy who have paid over 10 USD in policy fees in one transaction.

For veNPM holders, please fill out this form to receive a refund for your veNPM to NPM conversion penalty.

From the end of June there will no longer be NPM emission incentives for LPs i.e. Epoch 3 of the liquidity gauge emissions will be canceled.

Unused funds raised from financial backers will be returned to those backers; this includes DEX liquidity that has now been removed from SushiSwap and Uniswap. A small amount of liquidity on SushiSwap Arbitrum has been left to enable a minimum amount of NPM trading.

The protocol will be open sourced, and become a true public good. Enabling the community to fork the code developed by the Neptune Mutual team such that others might use the existing resources to further our mission to make the blockchain space better protected against smart contracts and other risks.

There are numerous factors that have led to this difficult decision, some of which are external factors which are uncontrollable or unforeseeable. A few factors summarized below:

CEX Listing#

“Given Neptune Mutual’s Tier 1 backers, why have you not listed on a top CEX?”

This is perhaps one of the most frequently asked questions. In short, the answer is that for a variety of reasons Neptune Mutual was not able to achieve the diverse set of performance metrics (community size and engagement, marketplace user activity, DEX 24 hour trading volume, TVL growth etc.) required to list on top tier CEX. The CEXs that are prepared to list NPM token do not have the depth of liquidity or breadth of user-base to offer good prospects for NPM tokenholders.

Growth Performance#

The above point invariably leads to the question

“Why has Neptune Mutual not achieved strong growth?”

It is tempting to take a shortcut to answer this question by pointing a finger at one specific factor, but the reality is that there are many contributing factors. A few summarized below:

The DeFiInsurance Narrative#

Since the outset of engaging with the community we have endeavored to highlight the need for DeFiInsurance; Neptune Mutual built a comprehensive dataset of on-chain hacks available, anywhere, and each week we highlight the many millions of dollars that are stolen as a result of smart contract hacks. Despite this, we have consistently been confronted by projects unwilling to spin up cover pools in our marketplace because of the sentiment that audits of their code are sufficient to persuade their community that their protocol is safe. Less than 0.3% of all digital assets are protected with some form of DeFiInsurance, and yet despite all the media reports of hacks, the conference discussions about the importance of governance or CEX proof-of-reserves, it continues to be the case that it is extremely difficult to get media attention to focus on the need for a fast and efficient means of mitigating smart contract risk.

A variety of approaches have been taken by different DeFiInsurance protocols to address this, from attending multiple conferences throughout the year and significant marketing spend, to the leaner approach that Neptune Mutual took (in part as a result of the bear market in 2023). What can be said is that no DeFiInsurance protocol has managed to achieve significant growth over the last 18 months, sadly the overall TVL of the sector has shrunk a lot.

Continue to Invest in Growth, or Refund?#

For all the reasons above, at this moment the best course of action is no longer to double-down on investing in growth, but rather to refund unused capital and close the marketplaces.

The consequences are very tough for the Neptune Mutual team who have spent the past 3 years of their time on the mission to facilitate  safer environments within DeFi.  The team has delivered products according to the roadmap and the fact that the protocol was never hacked, despite attempts being made on the darkweb, is testament to the expertise, passion and absolute focus on security.  The team survived the FTX and UST crisis unscathed, and believed that the continued growth in hacks would lead to growth in the demand for a good solution to mitigate these risks, but sadly, as can be seen right across the DeFiInsurance category, this is not yet in sight. So we would like to thank the team for all the dedication, skill and passion invested into the Neptune Mutual project since the outset.

What's Next?#

The team will open source the protocol, including blockchain indexing protocol (subgraph alternative), frontend, middleware, database, and backend code, to make it a true public good. This will allow anyone to fork the code and create covers by defining parameters and premium ranges, potentially leading to innovative covers and organic usage.

The Discord channel will be closed to reduce the risk of phishing and other types of cyber attack, any questions / queries will be responded to in the Telegram channel.

We want to take this final opportunity to thank you all for your support.

Disclaimer:#

Neptune Mutual will contact only its financial backers, with whom a signed agreement exists, in relation to next steps (i.e. holding NPM tokens does not qualify you for any form of refund). Contact will be made only from a neptunemutual.com domain email address so please check the source of any email you may receive very carefully. Please ignore any messages from any other email or social media accounts in relation to token/cash refunds.

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Weekly Report (Apr-4)

4 min read
Weekly Report
Weekly Report Apr4

In one of the largest crypto hacks of all time, the Ronin Network lost over $600 million.

TL;DR#

  • In one of the largest crypto hacks of all time, the Ronin Network lost over $600 million in stolen digital assets.
  • Inverse Finance suffered a $15 million loss in a manipulation bug exploit.
  • OpenSea announced its upcoming integration with the Solana blockchain.
  • Liverpool Football Club launched LFC Heroes Club NFT; AS Monaco joined hands with Capital Block as their NFT Consultant.
  • Warner Bros is set to release an exclusive set of Batman NFTs.

Several companies have filed for traditional patents to protect their brands from being co-opted by NFT creators, more companies are sure to follow. It is important for distinctive regulations, and protection strategies to be kept in place for artists, content creators, and brands to allow users to ripe these benefits in a multitude of ways.

Blockchain Hacks#

Ronin, an EVM blockchain for play-to-earn games and a vital bridge chain for Axie Infinity, was hacked in one of the largest hacks in blockchain history. 173,600 ETH was stolen from the Ronin network, and another 25.5 million USDC was taken from the Ronin bridge, totaling $614 million in stolen assets. According to a community notice published by Ronin, the incident occurred after Ronin validator nodes and Axie DAO validator nodes were infiltrated, resulting in hacked private keys being used to fabricate two fake network withdrawals that absorbed hundreds of millions of dollars in crypto from the bridge. The stolen assets have been funneled into FTX, Huobi, and CryptoCom, all of which have pledged to track down the funds.

Another victim of a reentrancy flaw was Voltage Finance whose protocol was exploited by hackers who stole more than $4 million in stablecoins and cryptocurrencies from the DeFi platform's lending pool. Voltage assured users that all assets in its custody, including staked tokens and tokens in liquidity pools, are safe, and that their smart contracts have been audited. They've been attempting to contact the attacker and negotiate a reward for the restoration of funds, while the platform is investigating the matter with its lending-as-a-service partner Ola Finance.

Inverse Finance, a stable coin protocol that focuses on capital efficient yield generation, was victimised by a multi-million dollar exploit, allowing the hacker to withdraw assets worth $15 million in ETH, WBTC, and YFI, among other currencies. According to multiple reports, the hacker deposited 901 Ethereum into the protocol and then used an oracle manipulation bug to manipulate the price of Inverse's INV token, allowing him to borrow assets and drain the protocol.

Metaverse, and NFTs#

Visa has announced the launch of the "Visa Creator Program," a one-year product planning and mentorship program for entrepreneurs in the arts, music, fashion, and cinema who want to use NFTs to grow their business. The new effort intends to assist a global cohort of digital creators interested in growing their businesses with digital collectibles by equipping them with knowledge of blockchain, NFTs, and Web3 technology.

The biggest NFT marketplace, OpenSea, has announced that the Solana blockchain will be integrated into its platform in the upcoming April integration. OpenSea will be the first NFT platform to allow the buying and selling of Solana and Ethereum-based NFTs. This is a long-awaited shift that industry experts believe reflects a positive sentiment for the wider NFT market, as well as reciprocal benefits across both ecosystems.

Liverpool Football Club has jumped onto the NFT bandwagon with the launch of the LFC Heroes Club collection on Polygon. The Legendary is a set of one-of-a-kind NFTs featuring 24 LFC men's team players that will be auctioned off, while the Hero limited edition NFTs will be priced at $75 and represent one LFC player or manager with distinct traits. Fans who purchase these NFT collections will gain exclusive access to an LFC community forum, holders-only experiences, virtual hang-outs, competitions, and LFC merch discounts, among many other things.

In other news, AS Monaco has become the first French Ligue 1 Club to debut on the NFT market. The sports team has partnered with Capital Block, an innovative NFT consultancy specialising in sports clubs, with the goal of developing a powerful community and outstanding fan experiences in the Metaverse.

Warner Bros is set to launch a digital collectible collection in partnership with Palm NFT Studio. One of the most well-known superheroes, Batman, will receive a massive NFT drop consisting of 200,000 unique Bat Cowl NFTs patterned on the renowned Batman mask, which will provide holders with exceptional perks. Bat Cowl NFTs will provide fans with unprecedented access to the DC Universe, as well as a two-year plan of utility, features, value, and other surprises.

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Tags

Weekly Report OpenSea Warner Bros Blockchain Hacks Ronin Network Inverse Finance Metaverse NFTs Liverpool NFTs Decentralized Insurance Parametric Insurance Crypto Insurance

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