Qu’est-ce que Convex ? (CVX)

• Convex optimizes yields and enables liquidity mining rewards for the Curve protocol.
• Convex Finance was officially launched in May 2021 by a pseudonymous person or group of people.
• CVX can be staked on the Convex platform for a share of Curve LP's CRV earnings and is used for voting on the protocol’s specific token allocations.

Convex is a yield optimizer for the Curve protocol that lets token holders earn boosted Curve (CRV) rewards. Curve is a decentralized exchange (DEX) liquidity pool on Ethereum specifically designed for swapping stablecoins. 

Dubbed a “DeFi 2.0 protocol”, Convex is part of a subset of second-generation decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols that provide yield farming services. Holders of Curve’s native token (CRV) and Curve liquidity providers (LPs) are able to stake their tokens via Convex. 

Staking through Convex allows users to earn Convex’s native CVX token as well as a share of boosted CRV as rewards. 

CVX can be staked on the Convex platform for a share of Curve LP's CRV earnings.  Additionally, CVX is used for voting on the allocation of tokens on the Convex platform. Participants must lock their CVX tokens on the platform for a minimum period of time  before they can participate in the protocol’s governance process.

Like Bitcoin (BTC), whose pseudonymous founder Satoshi Nakamoto remains unknown, Convex was created by an unknown person or group of people going by the name C2tp. It is assumed the founder(s) came from a software development background, though this is yet to be officially verified.

Convex launched in May 2021 and was whitelisted on the Curve platform in April that same year. Whitelisting followed a proposal that included requests to allow Convex to participate in Curve governance. Due to the sheer amount of CRV being deposited on Convex, Convex now custodies a significant portion of the tokens that allow holders to have a say in Curve’s governance.

Convex has a maximum supply of 100 million CVX tokens with 50% allocated toward rewarding Curve liquidity providers. A further 25% is to be distributed over four years for liquidity mining purposes and 9.7% of the tokens are held in the treasury.

While Curve’s CRV token is a vote escrowed token (veCRV), CVX is a fee-earning cryptocurrency that serves to simplify staking on Curve. Vote escrow is a term pioneered by Curve that refers to the act of locking CRV in order to gain governance voting rights.

Convex allows users to access liquidity and earn fees through Curve’s stablecoin pools. To achieve this, liquidity providers deposit tokens into Curve’s vaults and then stake them on Convex. Convex, which acts as an intermediary pool, auto-harvests these tokens and distributes the rewards to liquidity providers. 

Unlike yearn.finance’s vaults, which auto-sell harvested CRV as liquidity provider tokens, Convex’s rewards are distributed directly to users in either CRV or other reward tokens (such as SNX or LDO to name a few). Liquidity providers can also receive CVX as an additional reward that could be further compounded through the staking mechanism.

By depositing a certain amount of CRV tokens into Convex, users are entitled to receive cvxCRV tokens. These wrapped tokens can be staked for Convex’s own native CVX coin, as well as part of the CRV reward earned from Curve via Convex. Rewards include a 10% share of the CRV harvested by vaults and a portion of CVX tokens in the form of an airdrop. 

When a user deposits CRV into Convex, the protocol converts these holdings into veCRV and credits cvxCRV to the depositor at a nearly 1:1 ratio. Since users receive veCRV in return for locking up CRV, locking up more CRV can lead to larger yields. It is also possible to exchange cvxCRV for CRV at any time using Curve’s liquidity pool. 

Bien que le montant exact fluctue, Convex dispose généralement de milliards de dollars de valeur totale bloquée, ce qui en fait l’un des plus grands protocoles DeFi au monde actuellement. La valeur totale bloquée représente la somme de tous les crypto-actifs déposés dans un protocole DeFi.

Convex permet aux utilisateurs d’encaisser des frais de trading et d’obtenir des récompenses de staking de crypto sans avoir à bloquer du CRV, ce qui permet d’obtenir une source secondaire de récompenses sur les tokens qu’ils possèdent déjà grâce au réseau Curve. Cet avantage pour les utilisateurs de Convex explique en grande partie la croissance de Convex. 

Les stakers de CRV et les fournisseurs de liquidité de Curve obtiennent des récompenses pour le minage de liquidités CVX. 

Convex propose également les retraits gratuits et une commission de performance de 16% utilisée pour financer les coûts du gaz. Le gaz est une unité de mesure liée à la quantité d’énergie informatique nécessaire pour traiter et valider les transactions sur un réseau. 

En décembre 2021, le projet a annoncé qu’il allait s’élargir et intégrer le token FXS de Frax sur sa plateforme, une des raisons à ce partenariat étant la similitude entre le modèle de blocage de token de Frax et celui de Curve. 

Le secteur des stablecoins a connu une forte croissance, avec une capitalisation boursière totale de plusieurs centaines de milliards de dollars. Les utilisateurs qui estiment que l’équipe de Convex va continuer à développer le réseau et à créer des solutions utiles dans le secteur des stablecoins décideront peut-être d’utiliser leurs services. 

Les utilisateurs qui voient de la valeur dans une plateforme qui met au point des moyens innovants de gagner des récompenses sur les avoirs en crypto-monnaies pourraient être intéressés par Convex. En outre, ceux qui pensent que le réseau Convex va continuer à se développer peuvent également décider de détenir du CVX, dont l’offre maximale est de 100 millions de tokens. 

Le CVX peut également être staké sur la plateforme Convex en échange d’une part des bénéfices en CRV du fournisseur de liquidité Curve. Les participants peuvent également bloquer du CVX sur la plateforme afin de voter sur l’attribution de veCRV par le protocole.

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