Should the TrueFi DAO pay Archblock’s invoice for services provided during 2023? The total invoice amount is $272,676.15, and Archblock has requested to be paid first in USDC to the extent funds are available in the DAO’s treasury, and any remaining amount is to be paid in TRU tokens. Paying this invoice aligns with decentralization and community-driven governance of the DAO, as it is now a separate entity from Archblock, and therefore should operate independently.
Background & Rationale:
On July 27, 2022, TrueFi Foundation Ltd. (acting on behalf of the TrueFi DAO; hereafter referred to as the “DAO”) entered into a services agreement with TrustToken, Inc. (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Archblock, Inc.; hereafter referred to as “Archblock”) whereby Archblock would provide services to the DAO on an as-needed and continuing basis in exchange for a service fee consisting of all direct and indirect costs incurred plus a 10% mark-up of such costs. Such services include advice and assistance in compliance, software engineering, design, information technology, customer support, treasury management, credit underwriting, business development, special servicing of loan agreements, and other technical, professional, or general and administrative areas of a non-integral nature.
2023 Invoice Breakdown:
Software Engineering Services
Amount: $207,188.02
Description: Such services primarily consisted of smart contract security and verification audits paid for by Archblock on behalf of the DAO.
Customer Support Services
Amount: $7,200
Description: Such services consisted of Archblock maintaining and paying for the TrueFi community forum on behalf of the DAO.
Business Development Services
Amount: $5,500
Description: Such services consisted of TrueFi community manager payments Archblock facilitated on behalf of the DAO.
Non-Integral Support:
Amount: $27,999.39
Description: Such services primarily consisted of Archblock’s payments to independent DAO council members for their role as Directors of the TrueFi Foundation and representing the DAO.
10% Mark-up
Amount: $24,788.74
Description: See “Background & Rationale” above for details.
Invoice Total: $272,676.15
Other Costs Not Recharged:
In July 2023, Archblock met with representatives from LBank, a world leading cryptocurrency exchange, and negotiated listing of the TRU token for $40,000. This listing directly benefits the DAO by providing increased exposure and liquidity of the TRU token. As a show of good faith and commitment to the DAO’s success, Archblock decided to not charge the DAO for payment of this listing.
Yes, without a doubt! No questions asked, since the most of my enquiries on Archblock regarding their pledge of good faith towards Truefi have been addressed by @billwolf 's online presence throughout the years.
I think DAO should acknowledge the expenditures made by AB on TrueFi and the invoice should be resolved.
Onchain proposal on this topic should also include request for the TrueFi Foundation Board to change the relationship / agreement between AB and TrueFi Foundation so budget and scope for any future costs is guaranteed to be known to the governance in advance and agreed through governance process / voting procedures - to make it compatible with DAO mechanics.
kaimi, thank you for your comments. Regarding your second point on content of the proposal, would it be better to make this a separate proposal given it will affect 2024 onward, while the original proposal for payment of our invoice relates to 2023?
Yes, I think that’d be proper @Adam. If there are future services (beyond Archblock Special Servicing Update) provided by Archblock where the DAO will be expected to pay in the future, it is best to outline and formalize that agreement through a separate discussion and vote to this retroactive payment.
Regarding the current onchain vote (Tally | TrueFi Proposal) – in order for the DAO to compensate Archblock for the outlined 2023 services, this proposal needs to be resubmitted with executable code that would transfer some combination of stablecoins and TRU from the timelock treasury to Archblock should it be approved and executed.
@capitalm Having filed the claim on behalf of the Alameda Single Borrower Pool with the bankruptcy court as required by the deadline in 2023, we are now in a position of awaiting the determination of the timing for plan confirmation and the amount of recovery for unsecured lenders which is what the claim represents. There are no good estimates in the marketplace for expected timing for plan confirmation. We will post additional information when and if we have substantive updates. Thank you.
A quick update on this proposal. Initially, Archblock was going to request payment in a combination of USDC and TRU. However, given the DAO timelock treasury wallet only holds 2.76K USDC, we will modify the proposal to request the full payment be in TRU.
At the current price ($0.133), about 2,000,000 TRU tokens are required to cover the $272,676.15 invoice amount. To ensure the DAO has adequate TRU to pay the invoice in the event of price volatility between when the proposal is created and voting concludes, the executable code will include functions to mint and transfer 4,000,000 TRU to Archblock (i.e., a buffer of 2M tokens), and then Archblock will promptly transfer back any excess TRU above the invoice amount to the DAO treasury, based on the price of TRU at the time of receipt.
The rest(128.92k) would be calculated based on the price when posting the proposal and some additional buffer would be added - excess to be returned as in your proposal.
This proposal is soon to be scheduled for onchain voting.
@kaimi thank you for your input. For simplicity, we would prefer to be paid in a single currency, and either way a portion of the invoice would need to be paid in TRU (plus the buffer) and then any excess TRU returned. When we resubmit the proposal, in addition to including executable code for minting and transferring TRU to our wallet address, we’ll modify the first paragraph to read:
“Should the TrueFi DAO pay Archblock’s invoice for services provided during 2023? The total invoice amount is $272,676.15, and Archblock has requested to be paid in TRU tokens. Paying this invoice aligns with decentralization and community-driven governance of the DAO, as it is now a separate entity from Archblock, and therefore should operate independently.”
My humble ask would be for AB to reconsider accepting two tokens as favor to the DAO, as rebalancing two tokens into USDC should be easy for an “account wallet” while it is difficult for the DAO - and it seems obvious at this point that DAO should remove TUSD from its balance sheet.
If there are other reasons than simplicity then it of course is perfectly ok to move on with your plan.
Yes, we can accept the DAO’s 143.75K TUSD as partial invoice payment, but in the event TUSD is not trading at parity with $1 at the time of receipt (e.g., due to de-peg or insufficient exchange liquidity), we would make up the difference using additional TRU from the buffer. The first paragraph will be modified to read:
“Should the TrueFi DAO pay Archblock’s invoice for services provided during 2023? The total invoice amount is $272,676.15, and Archblock is requesting to be paid in a combination of 143,750 TUSD, and the remainder in TRU tokens. Paying this invoice aligns with decentralization and community-driven governance of the DAO, as it is now a separate entity from Archblock, and therefore should operate independently.”