From November 11 to 19, Usual’s governance token $USUAL achieved an astonishing increase from $0.2 to $1.3, an increase of more than 500% in just nine days.
Tether and Circle earned more than $10 billion in 2023, with a valuation of over $200 billion, but this wealth has nothing to do with users - their model is to privatize the profits of user deposits while transferring risks to society. Such a mechanism is exactly the same as the problems of traditional banking, and completely deviates from the original intention of decentralized finance.
Usual provides a new idea for stablecoins: redistributing value and power so that users can truly become the masters of the system. Through governance tokens, Usual returns all the benefits and decision-making power generated by the protocol to the community, allowing every participant to share the dividends of ecological growth.
In a market dominated by centralized giants, Usual attempts to break the status quo and create a fairer and more transparent financial system for users through DeFi.
What is Usual?
USUALLY is a fiat stablecoin issuer. Unlike Tether and Circle, it is a decentralized issuer rather than a highly centralized one . The recently popular $USUAL is a token they issued for redistributing ownership and governance .
USUALLY first appeared in people's vision at the beginning of this year. In April, it completed a US$7 million financing led by IOSG Ventures; in June, it released its own protocol Usual Protocol; in July, Usual was launched on the mainnet; on November 19, the $USUAL token was officially launched, and on December 23, Usual completed another US$10 million Series A financing.
Why choose decentralization?
Now, the stablecoin market has exceeded $100 billion, but its value is mainly concentrated in the hands of centralized giants such as Tether and Circle, and ordinary users can hardly benefit from it. This centralized model not only deprives users of their right to profit, but also limits the development of stablecoins to the control of a few institutions.
Usual has proposed a new solution to this market pain point: empowering users through decentralization and making them core participants in protocol infrastructure, funding, and governance, thereby breaking the monopoly of traditional stablecoins.
Usual's governance token $USUAL achieves 100% redistribution of value and control, ensuring that community users have the dominant position. By distributing governance tokens, the protocol returns revenue to users and third parties who contribute value, which not only optimizes the financial incentive mechanism, but also gives ecosystem participants more power and voice. Compared with the traditional model, Usual's decentralized design rewards early contributors and coordinates the interests of all stakeholders, making the protocol more dynamic and inclusive.
Currently, stablecoin issuers in the market can be roughly divided into three categories:
- Traditional model : For example, Tether distributes all revenue to its shareholders. Users only get a stablecoin compatible with DeFi, but cannot enjoy dividends from earnings or protocol growth.
- Yield stablecoins : Issued by institutions such as Ondo or Mountain, they allow users to share basic revenue through a licensing mechanism. However, users can only receive income, but cannot benefit from the growth of the protocol. For example, whether the TVL of USDM is $100 million or $100 billion, the user's income is always fixed at 5%.
- Usual Model : Usual combines yield and growth. By redistributing value through the $USUAL governance token, users not only receive stablecoin returns, but also have ownership and growth potential of the protocol.
Usual's decentralized concept has injected fresh ideas into the stablecoin market, making it unique in the stablecoin market.
USUAL's three core products
Usual's core products include: USD0, USD0++ and USUAL governance tokens. These three together constitute the core ecosystem of Usual.
USD0
USD0 is the first Liquidity Deposit Token (LDT) launched by Usual Protocol. It is backed 1:1 by real-world assets (RWA) such as U.S. Treasury bills, ensuring its extremely high stability and security. USD0 is not only a stablecoin pegged to the US dollar, but also a permissionless, composable asset that can be seamlessly integrated into the DeFi ecosystem. Through USD0, Usual enables users to make payments, transactions, and mortgage operations more securely while ensuring security that is not associated with traditional bank deposits.
USD0++
USD0++ is a staking version of USD0 and can also be considered a Liquidity Deposit Token (LST). Users can stake USD0++ as a 4-year bond in exchange for $USUAL tokens as a yield reward. USD0++ maintains the stability of USD0 while enabling users to obtain the benefits of the protocol through a decentralized revenue distribution mechanism. In addition, USD0++ also has high liquidity and composability, and can be widely used in DeFi protocols, providing holders with higher income potential.
USUAL Governance Token
The USUAL governance token is the core of the entire Usual Protocol, which gives holders decision-making and governance rights in the protocol. Through a decentralized governance mechanism, the USUAL token allows users to not only participate in the management of the protocol, but also gain actual benefits from the growth and benefits of the protocol. 90% of USUAL tokens will be allocated to the community, and only 10% will be left for the protocol team and investors, which ensures the dominance of the community and encourages more users to participate in the construction and development of the protocol.
Through these three core products, Usual not only provides stability and returns, but also ensures user control and value distribution in the protocol through a decentralized mechanism.
USUAL Token Economics
Many governance tokens on the market today have some design problems. Most token models are basically copied, and fail to effectively balance the interests of short-term speculators and long-term investors. As a result, token prices are easily affected by hype, causing selling pressure. At the same time, there is no close connection between the value, governance, and revenue potential of these tokens. They rely more on market enthusiasm to push up prices, but ignore creating actual value for users. Founders and teams usually hold a large number of tokens, while the value held by ordinary users is constantly eroded by inflation, which eventually leads to token depreciation.
Unlike these traditional tokens, Usual ensures that the interests of users, contributors, and investors can be aligned in the long term through a unique token economic model, thereby achieving sustainable value growth and real utility. This design avoids short-term speculation, focuses on stability and long-term value creation, and truly benefits every participant.
The USUAL token is the core of the Usual Protocol ecosystem, used primarily for governance, while also providing economic benefits to holders. The value of the token comes from the economic rights it represents and the actual returns from stablecoin collateral. Simply put, when the protocol generates revenue, the value of USUAL grows, so that holders can share in the growth of the protocol.
In terms of token distribution, in order to avoid excessive dilution, Usual mainly distributes 90% of USUAL tokens to users who contribute value and revenue to the protocol through the total value locked (TVL) of USD0. The total token holdings of the team, investors, and consultants will not exceed 10% of the total supply. This distribution method ensures that the interests of users will not be diluted due to excessive issuance.
USUAL's issuance mechanism is directly linked to the cash flow generated by stablecoin collateral. Every time a user stakes USD0, the protocol mints new USUAL tokens. As the protocol's revenue increases, the token supply will also increase. This design ensures that the issuance rate of tokens will not exceed the economic growth rate of the protocol, avoiding excessive inflation.
Usual's token issuance is a deflationary model, and the issuance rate is carefully calibrated to stay below the growth rate of protocol revenue. This means that as the protocol grows, USUAL tokens will become increasingly scarce, ensuring the long-term stability of the token's value.
In addition, USUAL holders will also participate in the decision-making of the protocol's financial management and decide how to use the protocol's income, such as by burning tokens or distributing income, etc. In this way, holders can not only govern the protocol, but also influence the protocol's financial strategy and long-term development.
Finally, USUAL holders can also earn rewards by staking tokens. When you stake USUAL tokens, they are converted into USUAL+, and users holding USUAL+ can receive up to 10% of newly minted USUAL tokens, depending on the issuance rules. This not only provides additional benefits, but also encourages users to participate in the construction and ecological development of the protocol in the long term.
Is it safe to make money by participating in the USUAL project without any risk?
The emergence of USUAL reminds people of The DAO and Luna, which were also promising projects in the entire cryptocurrency circle at first, but eventually collapsed in an instant due to contract loopholes or token economics. Although USUAL seems to have great potential, with innovative token economics and powerful security protection mechanisms, blockchain projects themselves have certain risks. No matter how carefully designed, the possibility of loopholes and attacks cannot be completely ruled out.
USUAL's Security Audit
USUAL has conducted five safety audits so far, and the audited organization is Cantina. Its audit work mainly includes:
Permission to initiate smart contract audits, permissionless initiation of smart contract audits, L2 token contracts, OFT MintAndBurnAdapter and L1 OFT Adapter, USD0++ and DAO collateral contracts, SwapperEngine and USUAL token contracts, USUAL distribution and airdrop contracts, Blackthorne audits, etc.
Although the security audit has been done, the private key storage method has not been disclosed. After all, there are precedents of DEXX and Radiant, so it does not mean that USUAL is necessarily safe.
Are there flaws in USUAL's security monitoring?
The monitoring framework provided by USUAL official documents is already very complete, but there are still some minor problems:
Limitations of monitoring coverage:
The current monitoring framework focuses on monitoring key operations within the protocol, but may not provide adequate real-time monitoring for external interfaces, third-party integrations, or interactions with other chains (such as cross-chain operations). If there are vulnerabilities in the interaction between the protocol and external systems or they are exploited by attackers, existing monitoring may not be able to detect the problem in time.
Threshold settings:
In the threshold alert system, abnormal trading volume, large token fluctuations, or price fluctuations may trigger an alert. However, market volatility and certain special events (such as large-scale transactions or market adjustments) may be mistaken for abnormal behavior. If the threshold setting is not intelligent enough or does not adapt to market changes, excessive alerts or underreporting may occur, resulting in untimely response or misleading.
Potential risks of multi-signature:
As in the case of the Radiant theft, although the activities of multi-signature wallets are monitored in real time, multi-signatures themselves may be at risk of mismanagement. If a member participating in the signature makes a mistake, is hacked, or acts maliciously, the monitoring system may not be able to detect abnormal authorization operations in advance.
at last
The USUAL protocol has done a great job in innovation, using a token issuance model tied to real income to ensure long-term value growth. In addition, its security mechanisms are also very strong, such as automatic "circuit breakers" that can immediately suspend operations when risks are detected to protect user assets. However, there are some potential risks, such as the possibility of misjudgment or omission of automatic defense mechanisms, and the security of multi-signatures and external interfaces also requires continuous attention.
Overall, USUAL’s design offers a promising solution to addressing the speculative issues of blockchain protocols and improving security.
