EP 53: The Mechanism Design of Maker (DAI and MKR) | The OG #StableCoin

Economics Design

In line with our recent focus on stablecoins, today we're going to explore the OG onchain stablecoin: MakerDAO. We will dive deeper into the economics of Maker, and understand how the $DAI ecosystem works.

MakerDAO is a novel and innovative protocol that allows for on-chain collateralised borrowing, while also creating a reasonably effective stablecoin. This gives the crypto community an alternative to fiat-backed stablecoins like $USDT. Furthermore, $MKR holders continue to make continual improvements to the protocol, that make MakerDAO better.

MakerDAO is an alternative source of leverage. Because it is an alternative way to gain access to leverage for those who do not wish to custody assets with a centralised exchange. Borrowing from Maker could also be cheaper when stability fees are low.

Any losses incurred by $DAI holders are backstopped implicitly by $MKR holders, who will be diluted in case the system as a whole becomes under-collateralised. This is a major advantage that Maker has versus other lending platforms on the market, where any losses are borne by the lender.

0:00 – Intro & Contents

0:34 – Analysing Maker

2:01 – Maker's Dual-Token Mechanism

3:42 – Maker's Reserve Mechanism

4:35 – Creating $DAI: How it works

6:47 – Maintaining Stability

11:40 – How Maker deals with market crashes

13:07 – Opinion: Maker vs Lending/Borrowing

14:38 – Opinion: Transparency

15:45 – Opinion: Multi-collateral & Past performance

Want more in-depth content?

1) Support us on our Patreon: www.patreon.com/economicsdesign

2) (Textbook) The Economics and Math of Token Engineering and DeFi https://book.economicsdesign.com/

3) Academy: https://academy.economicsdesign.com/

4) Newsletter: https://economicsdesign.substack.com

Connect with us and the ED community:

Discord – https://discord.gg/ZqgpzdbZP2

Twitter – https://twitter.com/econsdesign

Reddit – https://reddit.com/u/economicsdesign