Primer on Bonding

Vesq
7 min readOct 10, 2021

Vesq does everything a bit different. Thus, it should be no surprise that our LP rewards are unconventional. They are designed to both incentivize and lock liquidity by offering an attractive risk/reward profile, and they should introduce an interesting and net beneficial dynamic into the $VSQ market. So, how do they work?

Overview

Bonding is the process of trading an LP share to the protocol for VSQ. The protocol quotes an amount of VSQ and a vesting period for the trade. It is important to know: when you create your bond, you are giving up your LP share. The protocol compensates you with more VSQ than you’d get on the market, but your exposure becomes entirely to VSQ and no longer to VSQ-DAI LP.

Creating a bond

To create a bond, you must first add liquidity to the VSQ-DAI Sushiswap pool. You’ll then go to our website and select “Bond.” The protocol will quote a price for you. If you accept, you then send your LP share to the treasury and receive a claim on VSQ.

Redeeming a Bond

To redeem a bond, you’ll go to our website and select “redeem bond.” The protocol will recall when you bonded and your vesting term. If you have any pending rewards, you can claim them. Rewards accrue throughout the vesting period.

I’ve Redeemed My Bond…Now What?

Go stake those suckers! When you bond, you receive VSQ. You can either sell them (boooooo), you can stake them to earn more, or you can bond them again.

Note that xVSQ is the protocol’s profit accruing token and since bonders earn VSQ (not xVSQ), stakers earn 100% of protocol profits (minus the DAO’s cut). See our staking explainer for more info.

Why Do I Want to Bond?

Because it allows you to buy VSQ at a lower cost basis. In return for selling your LP, the protocol will sell you VSQ at a discount. You can see the difference in cost below (bonders get the Executing Price):

The Bonding Premium here is 2. The green area is the bonders profit. The yellow area is the protocols profit.

Dynamics of a Bond

The protocol quotes bond prices based on the protocol’s risk-free value (RFV). The Bond Premium is a protocol-governed policy tool that controls the premium charged for bonds. A lower premium means a higher discount and a higher incentive to bond.

Executing Price = RFV / Premium {Premium ≥ 1}

The premium is determined by the total debt of the system and a scaling variable. This ties the price of bonds to the number of bonds outstanding; the fewer bonds outstanding, the lower the premium and the higher the discount.

Premium = 1 + (Debt Ratio * BCV)
Debt Ratio = Bonds Outstanding / VSQ Supply

Left to right; BCV = 3, BCV = 2, BCV = 1, BCV = 0

Note: For the rest of the article we will consider the executing price as equal to the risk free value. The real executing price will be somewhere between the two, as determined by the Premium.
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The risk free value of the LP share for the protocol is the point at which the pool is balanced (1 VSQ = 1 DAI). Since the protocol must protect the backing of VSQ, this is the lowest price that it can accept; worst case, it can back every 2 VSQ bonded by 1 DAI and 1 VSQ. Above this equilibrium, there is an excess of DAI. Below this equilibrium, there is an excess of VSQ. Either can be used, and there will always be enough of both. This relationship is visualized and formulated below:

The red box is the protocol’s risk-free point, so it treats all LP as worth that much (black line)

Risk-Free Value = (LP / Total LP) * (Constant Product)

This means a bonder is (generally) selling their LP for below market value. However, this is cancelled out by the protocol bonding VSQ at below market value. You can see the relationship between the value of the LP sold, and the value of the VSQ bonded below:

Logarithmic Scale

Linear Scale

The exponential increase in the value of bonded VSQ relative to the value of the LP is expected to create increasing demand for bonds the higher price is. This is an extremely favorable dynamic; the higher price goes (and the more the protocol sells in response), the more liquidity there should be.

Bonders can make this trade, despite time risk, because their breakeven point has been reduced. The higher the price is, the greater that padding becomes.

Price vs Breakeven; Logarithmic Scale (see similar linear view above)

Difference between risk free value and market value

This trade only makes sense when VSQ trades for a premium. At a discount, it actually results in a higher breakeven than simply buying on the market. This is favourable because we want more liquidity at premiums (to hold that premium) and less liquidity at discounts (to force supply to sell at lower prices and to more easily recover). To compound this dynamic, the protocol will remove portions of the LP that it holds when price trades below IV, burning the VSQ and depositing the DAI into the treasury.

Conclusion

This is how we will incentivize users to provide liquidity. We expect it to:

  1. Permanently lock significant amounts of liquidity
  2. Positively correlate liquidity with price
  3. Lengthen premiums and shorten discounts
  4. Increase participation by introducing a second dominant strategy with a completely different risk profile (compared to buy and stake)
  5. Increase protocol profits by adding a second mechanism to burn VSQ (pulling LP)
  6. Pad the treasury balance sheet by marking the value of LP shares at equilibrium (they’re worth more than that any time price != $1). This means the intrinsic value of VSQ has a floor at 1 DAI, and the protocol marks at that floor, but it will actually be greater most of the time.
  7. Increase staking profits by deferring LP rewards to a separate mechanism so we can reserve all of the protocols profits for stakers
  8. Help grow Vesq!

Twitter: @VESQHQ
Medium: vesq.medium.com
Telegram: t.me/vesqhq
Discord: discord.gg/KVFbg7q
Website: vesq.io

Legal Disclaimers
The information provided in this Medium Post pertaining to Vesq,
Inc. (“Vesq” or the “Company”), its crypto-assets, business assets,
strategy, and operations, is for general informational purposes only and is not
a formal offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy any securities,
options, futures, or other derivatives related to securities in any
jurisdiction and its content is not prescribed by securities laws. Information
contained in this Medium Post should not be relied upon as advice to buy or
sell or hold such securities or as an offer to sell such securities. This
Medium Post does not take into account nor does it provide any tax, legal or
investment advice or opinion regarding the specific investment objectives or
financial situation of any person. Vesq and its agents, advisors,
directors, officers, employees and shareholders make no representation or
warranties, expressed or implied, as to the accuracy of such information and Vesq expressly disclaims any and all liability that may be based on such information or errors or omissions thereof. Vesq reserves the right to amend or replace the information contained herein, in part or entirely, at any time, and undertakes no obligation to provide the recipient with access to the amended information or to notify the recipient thereof. The information contained in this Medium Post supersedes any prior Medium Post or conversation concerning the same, similar or related information. Any information, representations or statements not contained herein shall not be relied upon for any purpose. Neither Vesq nor any of its representatives shall have any liability whatsoever, under contract, tort, trust or otherwise, to you or any person resulting from the use of the information in this Medium Post by you or any of your representatives or for omissions from the information in this Medium Post.
Additionally, the Company undertakes no obligation to comment on the
expectations of, or statements made by, third parties in respect of the matters
discussed in this Medium Post.

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