# IDLE token improvement proposals

**URL:** <https://gov.pareto.credit/t/idle-token-improvement-proposals/1163>\
**Category:** 💡 Ideas & Improvements\
**Created:** [May 13, 2023, 3:15am UTC](https://gov.pareto.credit/t/idle-token-improvement-proposals/1163 "2023-05-13T03:15:24Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![matus.eth](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex031/user_avatar/gov.pareto.credit/matus.eth/32/1074_2.png) [@matus.eth](https://gov.pareto.credit/u/matus.eth)\
**Post date:** [May 13, 2023, 3:15am UTC](https://gov.pareto.credit/t/idle-token-improvement-proposals/1163/1 "2023-05-13T03:15:24Z")

</div>

Hi All,

My name is Matus (@msteis on Twitter), in crypto for 5 years, an ex-Outlier Ventures Token Design Lead, advised 50+ projects on token economy design.

I’ve been following Idle for some time and noticed that the utility of the protocol itself does not really do justice to the price of its token. I did some thinking and would have a couple of ideas on how to improve the value accrual mechanisms of the token.

I do realize that many of you have been working on Idle for a number of years, so I don’t want this to seem as too prescriptive, but rather as the beginning of a discussion and a collection of thoughts from multiple sides.

In my experience, token economics is largely about ensuring that demand for the core utility of the protocol is proportional to the demand for the token, and ideally inversely proportional to the token supply. That’s why various forms of staking are often the simplest and most elegant way forward. Rising demand for the protocol utility causes higher demand for the token (as it needs to be staked to get access to that utility), and the staking mechanism causes supply to shrink (as tokens are staked). Higher demand & lower supply = positive price impact.

Here is a couple of ideas as to what the IDLE token utilities could be that came to my mind:

1. Staking IDLE tokens in exchange for access to premium features on Best Yield, e.g. users who have staked at least x IDLE tokens or at least y $ value in IDLE tokens get priority access to new pools, get priority when redeeming idleTokens during congested periods, etc., this could be further brainstormed with someone who knows more about the product and its roadmap.

2. Safety Module backstopping e.g. the senior tranche on Yield Tranches, i.e. users stake IDLE tokens in a smart contract called Safety Module and earn yield (coming from fees and / or newly minted tokens), hereby increasing security of the deposits in senior tranches in cases of black swan events / hacks, etc.

3. Staking for gas fee rebates, e.g. users who have at least x IDLE tokens staked get their gas fees rebated when interacting with the protocol’s smart contracts.

The pattern here is that we’d layer additional utilities onto the token, so that more users would want to buy it and lock it away from the circulating supply.

Also have other ideas in mind and would be happy to discuss further if the community thinks this is something that would help!

---

_[View the full topic](https://gov.pareto.credit/t/idle-token-improvement-proposals/1163)._