While you may or may not be aware, Yearn's V3 system has been in development for quite some time. And while we are no strangers to product delays this one's been a doozie. However, finally the time has come. The contracts are deployed, the front end is built, the social media intern is all hyped up on mountain dew and V3 is ready for launch.
So, with launch imminent it seems like the perfect time for a little reflection on where we are today, how we got here, and most importantly where we hope to go in the years to come.
While the Yearn intern continues to drop heaters on main, I plan for this to be the first of a series of longer form articles expanding on the ideas and goals of our new system. As well as some more in-depth technical details of how it all works and where we hope it ends.
And on the seventh day Andre said, Let there be Yield!
From its humble beginnings as a super nerds pet project till today, Yearn has embodied so many of the qualities and ideals of DeFi that many of us hold dear and were drawn here for in the first place.
Everything from its VC free founding, its initial token launch, being one of, if not, the only projects to not just survive but thrive post its founders departure, all the way till today. Running as a smorgasbord of anon cartoon animals, scattered across the globe all working towards the common goal of bringing simple, permissionless and transparent financial products to the world.
It has survived when most failed. Endured when most quit. And held true to the principles it was founded with, despite the ever increasing pressures to take the easy way out.
While the band of misfits that work on Yearn may look different from one month to the next. The foundational principles remain the same. Operating the way we do certainly comes with its own issues. But in the end makes the system stronger; and is what drove me personally from a wannabe shadowy super coder during DeFi summer to find my way into this beautiful chaotic new world.
Wait… was my mom right?
It's no secret crypto and DeFi have been in a bit of what you might call... a slump. Yield aggregator's were hit as hard as anyone given the macro conditions. And unfortunately for us there's no magic money printer in the back, or dials we can crank up or down to change our fortune.
Yet still despite that Yearn has carried on.
Yearn V2 remains one of the highest quality smart contract systems in existent. It has securely directed millions of dollars of yield to vault depositors through the past years. Despite countless hacks, rug pulls and the overall general malfeasance that runs rampant through this childish industry we all come home; Yearn depositors have been able to rest easy knowing their funds are as safe as anywhere in DeFi.
Thanks to the work of its architect @fubuloubu and the countless Chad strategist's (or "Chadegist's" if you will), it has endured more in the past few years than most systems will in a lifetime.
And while we have been hit hard by the bear market like most, Yearn has continued to build all the way through and is poised to come out stronger than before.
It's ship city, bitch, ship ship city…. bitch!
For those that haven't been paying attention, Yearn has spent the last year building and shipping products at a phenomenal rate "Insert cheesy bear market building meme".
Let's quickly recap just 2023 shall we!
Our team of curve Chadegist's (patent pending) launched permissionless vaults.
Some other Chadegist’s (and definitely not any dev crossover) built out some new factory vaults, which may or may not still be receiving OP boosts!
A totally different set of dev’s that absolutely, 100%, without question are not the same as the others just launched yPrisma in record time, as well as yLQTY for you decentralized stable coin maxis.
Everyone’s favorite anime cats went ahead and just invented an entirely new primitive with yETH.
And let us not forget the long awaited arrival of veYFI.
Now some have noted that the rumblings of a new bull market started at just about the same time as our launch of veYFI....
Which has led to the obvious question..... Is it possible that Yearn and the YFI token are once again the catalyst that will kick off the next bull run and send our bags into the stratosphere once more to get us all those Lambo's BitBoy keeps bragging about?
Well that's not for us to say.
Yes.
Either way, its been quite a year for a small group of anons that have no schedules, employment contracts, deadlines or water coolers to gossip around (fucking Barbara and her bullshit).
But even after all that, there is still one more product left for us to ship this year!
V3 aims to not just be the next iteration of vaults for Yearn but DeFi as a whole. We have taken permissionlessnessness to the next level. With the hope to bring both new yield opportunities to Yearn users, as well as give the rest of DeFi the core infrastructure and code to build their own vaults on top of.
Our allocator vaults are improved versions of the V2 vaults. They allow Yearn to continue to push ownership and control of our own offerings to be more decentralized. And allow for complete customization by anyone wishing to run a multi strategy vault. The new design allows for new vault types such as Junior Tranches; and the profit reporting and debt management have been re-designed for increased capital efficiency by allowing all funds to be deployed 100% of the time.
Our Tokenized Strategies are completely rebuilt to now be stand alone, permissionless, single strategy vaults themselves. They are the easiest way to build your own custom vault bar none. And allow for whole new levels of composability.
Both are fully ERC-4626 compatible, come with all the bells and whistle's and of course permissionless to deploy yourself. They come with a suite of periphery contracts that can be used to customize and fine tune a vault to unprecedented degrees. No need to launch your own fork or develop your own vaults, just use ours.
How does the saying go?
‘If you come for the king... we will invite you into our telegram groups and give you step by step instructions on how to build the best possible product.’
The launch of V3 won't be flashy or all at once. As with everything we do, we plan to take the same cautious and security focused mind set that led to us being a leader in security in DeFi in the first place. Our initial launch focus will be on Polygon, with the rollout set to begin in the coming weeks.
We will continue to release more products, vaults and expanding to additional chains in the coming months. So keep a steady eye on the Yearn twitter feed for more announcements, and be on the look out for the next installment of this series where we will begin to dive deeper into the nitty gritty details of the V3 system.
In the meantime, if you just can't wait, feel free to read more about V3 by visiting our official docs or the YIP. And if you are a developer/wanna be Chadegist itching to build with us, reach out on Twitter, Telegram or Discord.
Pro tip: @omgCorn loves it when people send him pictures of their feet to signal their interest in building on V3.
Long live DeFi.
Long Live Yearn.