Proposed Changes to Mitigate Risks
MakerDAO has proposed several changes to mitigate the risks to its protocol. These include reducing the debt ceiling of several liquidity provider collaterals, reducing the daily minting limits of its USDC peg stability module, increasing the fee from 0% to 1%, and eliminating exposure to Curve Finance and Aave. The firm is also proposing to increase the debt ceiling for the Paxos Dollar stablecoin issued by Paxos Trust Company.
Reducing Debt Ceiling and Daily Minting Limits
MakerDAO has proposed reducing the debt ceiling of several liquidity provider collaterals to 0 DAI. The daily minting limits of the USDC peg stability module will be reduced from 950 million DAI to 250 million DAI, and the fee will be increased from 0% to 1% to prevent excessive dumping of USDC. If the proposal passes, the daily minting limit of another stablecoin module, GUSD, will also be reduced from 50 million DAI to 10 million DAI.
Eliminating Exposure to Curve Finance and Aave
MakerDAO wants to eliminate its exposure to the decentralized finance protocols Curve Finance and Aave. According to Maker, Curve presents a risk of bad debt accrual and potential bank runs with cascading market insolvency. While Aave doesn't have such risks, Maker stated that its overall risk-reward of depositing funds into the D3M is unfavorable.
Increasing Debt Ceiling for Paxos Dollar
Finally, MakerDAO proposes increasing the debt ceiling for the Paxos Dollar stablecoin issued by Paxos Trust Company from 450 million DAI to 1 billion. The firm has stated that Paxos has relatively stronger reserve assets than other centralized stablecoins, consisting primarily of U.S. Treasury bills, and faces a lower impairment potential.
Conclusion
On March 10, USDC debugged from the U.S. dollar after its issuer, Circle, disclosed that it had $3.3 billion worth of funds collateralizing the stablecoin stuck in the now-defunct Silicon Valley Bank. At the time of publication, USDC is trading at $0.9025. In light of the news, the DAI stablecoin has also depegged to $0.9235.
