[Blave.org] GCGP - Cross-exchange Off-chain Trading Data Integration on gTrade

[Kenjisrealm]

SECTION 1: APPLICATION OVERVIEW

Provide a brief summary of your application. This section should introduce the reader to your project, explaining its intentions, objectives, and scope.

• Which category of integration is your project applying for: gTrade v8, data catalog and connectivity.

• How many $ARB tokens are you applying for: 20,000 $ARB

• Please provide a description of your project: Blave is a cross-exchange trading data station dedicated to provide traders with aggregated off-chain derivatives data and validation services.

• How will you integrate gTrade and what benefit does it bring to your users:

1. Blave plans to integrate gTrade data to build the unique, intuitive datasets and tools for traders to use, eventually, we aim to integrate Blave’s data natively on gTrade v9.
2. Blave users mostly from CEXs, they will have chance to explore the advantages of the decentralized perpetual exchange, also discover DEX data charts by our integration.
3. Blave users will have more motivations to explore novel trading experiences due to the integration with gtrade, such as gTrader benefits and unique charts.

You can check our GCGP Proposal Deck: Blave Product Integration Deck - Google Slides

• What are your plans for the requested grant and how does it bolster the gTrade integration:

  • Blave plans to utilize 20,000 $ARB to anchoring three main goals: boost adoption, activate prospects, innovation use case. Below are the $ARB token distribution plan:

    1. Data Contribution Reward: 25% (5,000 $ARB)

       Description: Using Blave loyalty system for reward distribution. Users can obtain loyalty point through data contribution, chart sharing, etc.

       • The loyalty distribution rule and policy will release as GCGP initiate.

    2. Reserve for Discount: 25% (5,000 $ARB)

       Description: Additional incentives for users to use gTrade, which they can have discount if they want to subscribe pro plan . This is the alternative way to encourage non-gTrader to join gTrade. If you familiar with Tradingview, we use same tactic to activate those prospects.

       • 5,000 $ARB will distribute to the gTrade users, 25 $ARB each, which is approximately a 15%~20% price compensation on the paid plan.
       • In case if reserve does not use up for the purpose, the remaining amount will be allocated to data contribution reward.

    3. Development Cost: 50% (10,000 $ARB)

       Description: Basic costs for data integration and development, API & server expense, etc.

       • Blave team need to collect data and develop customized gTrade charts on Blave website, such as gTrade Holder Concentration, Top 25 gTraders Portfolio.

• Provide a timeline and set of milestones with expected ARB payout per:
  

  

  • Pre-GCGP: Organize smooth integration details and procedures with gTrade team to ensure maximum results and our goals can be achieved.

  • Milestone 1 (~Week 3): Release 3 gTrade charts, including Holder Concentration, Whale Hunter and Top 25 gTrader Portfolio, besides, Blave will conduct announcements about gTrade integration and related campaigns. It’s expected to receive 10,000 $ARB after M1 achieved for development cost and paid-plan discount reserve.

  • Milestone 2 (~Week 8): Include gTrade data into Blave alert and screener features. Additional promotional and educational contents will release during event period to strengthen integration results and introduce traders how to well-utilize data for trading. It’s expected to receive 10,000 $ARB after M2 achieved for development cost and data contribution reward.

  • Later Stage & Post-GCGP (Week 11~): Review GCGP integration performances, conduct announcements about GCGP and reward distribution, also, arrange next stage integration & partnership discussion with gTrade.

SECTION 2: APPLICANT INFORMATION

Provide personal or organizational details, including the applicant’s name, contact information, and the name of any associated organization. This information ensures proper identification and communication throughout the grant process.

• Applicant Name or Alias: Kenji
• Project Name: Blave
• Project Description: Blave is a cross-exchange trading data station dedicated to provide traders with aggregated off-chain derivatives data and validation services.
• Team Members and Qualifications:
  • Wei
    • Role: Founder
    • Background: Former quantitative trader at Masterlink Securities, Nan Shan Life Insurance and Kronos Research, managed over $200m and high sharpe ratio track record with diversified assets and strategies.
    • Responsibilities: product, full stack development, team organization.
  • Wan
    • Role: CEO
    • Background: Ex Kronos Software Engineer, Ex Kronos Trader and Mk3 Co-Founder.
    • Responsibilities: data analysis, backend, operations, fundraising.
  • Kenji, CFA
    • Role: COO
    • Background: Fintech and Web3 project builder. 10 years of experience in financial domains, founder of RWA project- InVar Finance, former COO at centralized exchange.
    • Responsibilities: project operation, marketing, user management, business and partnership development, etc.
  • Rose
    • Role: UI/UX Designer
    • Background: Gen Z, UIUX enthusiast.
    • Responsibilities: UI/UX, graphic design, user experience research.
• Project Links:
  • Website: blave.org
  • Twitter: https://twitter.com/__Blave__
  • Discord: https://discord.gg/D6cv5KDJja
• Contact Information:
  • Telegram: @kenjisrealm
  • Twitter: @kenjisrealm
  • Email: kenji@blave.org
• Are you currently a grant recipient in other $ARB incentive programs? (eg. STIP.B, LTIPP, an Abritrum Incubator program or else: No.

SECTION 3: GRANT DETAILS

Outline the requested grant amount, and provide an overview of the budget breakdown, specify the funding and contract addresses, and describe any matching funds if applicable. ****

• Funding Address: 0xC0626C4d5Be97d13281398a22bEED878Cae304fE
• Funding Address Details: Blave Arbitrum treasury, 2/3 multisig with securely stored private keys.
• Other Contract Addresses: N/A

SECTION 4: DATA & REPORTING

Please describe how your team will be able to provide data & reporting on the grant distribution.

• Is your team prepared to provide Dune graphs and/or Dashboards for your incentive program?: Yes, we will develop a Dune dashboard for presenting $ARB distribution status.
• How does your team plan on posting bi-weekly program updates on the Gains Network forum? We will post our GCGP plan progress and performance bi-weekly, Blave project update as well.
  • Expected Report Framework:
    -Key Takeaways
    -GCGP Progress & Implementation
    -Blave Updates
    -Tractions

[jomahe]

I’m not entirely sure if this sort of project is in the spirit of the GCGP. This seems to be constructed in a way to siphon the $ARB grant from gTrade and into the ecosystem of Blave.

Specifically, I don’t like the proposed airdrop of the $ARB to Blave users (not necessarily gTrade users) we would potentially be granting and I don’t like the use of $ARB to incentivize signing up for a paid plan to Blave.

Going through the slides, I think that some of the trader insights could be useful, specifically the Blave-unique charts. However, I’m dubious that the proposal in its current state will bring enough of a benefit to gTrade to justify the 20,000 $ARB request.

I would like to see some further elaboration on points 1 and/or 2 to justify keeping them in the proposal or removed from the plan entirely. I think that 10,000 $ARB for development is potentially fair but would also like to hear more about the accessibility of these metrics. Will they be behind a paywall (inaccessible without purchase of the paid plan) and do you have data and/or testimonials that these metrics are helpful to traders?

[Kenjisrealm]

Thanks for your opinions and questions, I am glad to answer your concerns and explain why we think the Blave with gTrade integration is important and fit to the purpose of GCGP.

First, we are focusing on the goals of bringing new awareness, user activation and novel use case for both gTrade and Blave. Currently, DeFi still looks promising but facing adoption dilemma. More integration with different types of partner, not just DeFi-to-DeFi integration, could really create a breakthrough for existing pains.

Blave, certainly, is not a DeFi project, or maybe you can treat us as a Web2.5 project, however, we positioning Blave as a crypto trader oriented project to support traders make better trading decisions and reduce their information processing costs. Therefore, Blave user base are larger than gTrade in addition to mostly user from CEXs. So, I believe the next question will be main TA of gTrade for new crypto stage is? CEX users after more regulated era? Or limited DEX users?

Blave acquired more than 6,500 users with 10~17% DAU rate (~700~1,000 DAU) since the website launched on Feb. 2024. The tractions we got so far is all organic, we didnt spend cost on KOL marketing, ads and campaigns, etc. Collaboration and integration are the key to success.

Second, the $ARB distribution design is not aiming for rewarding existing Blave users, but for incentivize real users of gTrade and Blave. The 1st part is organized to be a reward pool binding with Blave loyalty system due to easy-to-manage contribution calculation. Blave users (new & old) can acquire loyalty points through multiple metrics, as illustration below:

We add gTrade-focused metrics to let users earn more points!

The Blave Loyalty Program as image above, users can acquire Blave loyalty point if they meet certain metric, let me explain one-by-one below:
-API Conncetion: user connect their exchange API (mostly CEX) they can get the points.
-Referral: user refer their friend to join Blave and connect API then the referrer get another points.
-Activity: the frequency and amount of user trading activities every day, more trading activities more point they get.
-Influence: user sharing Blave charts or portfolio performance can earn the points. *If have gTrade chart can earn more!
-Paid: user subscribe Blave Pro Plan can earn the point.
-gTrade: user use gTrade from Blave website (with referral link to check) can earn points!

Each metric contributes to the quality and diversity of our data, which means more insight and validity, also, will bring more positive effect to gTrade and Blave integration. gTraders will share the benefits from the ARB incentives not only just earn it but more useful charts and tools will turn back to the integration. Additionally, the 2nd part is mainly designed for gTraders if they want to activate advanced features, they can get ARB compensation (like discount), this is another type of method to encourage trader to try gTrade.
The remaining ARB reserve for paid-plan compensation will reallocate to 1st part.

Third, we believe this integration is not an one-time event, we plan to iterate on the integration with gTrade and make necessary adjustments based on performance and feedback. The integration, API package to gTrade, will be free and customized to fit gTrade environment at least for ARB STIP period, however, we hope it can be free for longer term, but it depends on API data sourcing cost.

Final, about data validity, we are institutional quant trading team, some of the Blave datasets are validated through our profitable quant trading strategies, that say, some data are used as factors within the strategies. Also, we conducted some backtesting of the datasets you see on Blave, like Holder Concentration, Market Sentiment and Capital Shortage Index.

You can check our leaderboard, one of them are from our team for showcasing the strategy effectiveness no matter in uptrend or downtrend.
https://www.blave.org/studio/en/leaderboard

To sum up, I personally think Blave and gTrade integration could be a worth-to-try innovation that any DEX didnt do so, we cannot predict the real outcome might be but we will do our best to bring more awareness to gTrade in a legit and smoothy way. Hope my response here can solve your concerns and questions. Thanks again.

[Kenjisrealm]

Due to new users constraints…here the Blave DAU tractions.

[Kenjisrealm]

Quick overview about what Blave integration proposal:

gTrade charts, users can share gTrade charts and direct user to gTrade platform.

[Kenjisrealm]

Due to receive some feedback from gTrade community, I have to clarify the purpose of Blave initial grant distribution plan. Especially about 1st and 2nd distribution, We are not aiming to allure existing gTraders to join Blave, our currently beachhead market are CEXs’ traders, the reason behind it just want to support gTrade innovation and organize more incentives for traders to adopt gTrade.

The initial idea of those two is make some motivation for non-gTraders to try gTrade because of those compensations. If prospect pro trader can use gTrade and can get some discount on pro plan then that make sense. However, I may be idealism on these design.

I already made some revise on the proposal to make our purpose of proposal more clearly to understand, besides, our team can withdraw those 10,000 ARB grant back to gTrade if really not fit for GCGP.