The Stargate Foundation has collected the above questions and attempted to respond to all of them below. Please let us know if there are follow-ups or unanswered questions.
Q: Will the solver operate under the Stargate Brand
A: No it will not initially. The idea is to fund solvers that align closely with Stargate, and use Stargate for balancing where possible. But broadly capturing the opportunity available for a well-capitalised DAO like Stargate.
Q. Will the Solver be a third-party entity, not directly managed by the Stargate Foundation? If so, this adds a trust assumption for an external party, which raises concerns to me.
A: The solvers could be managed by a third party. The Stargate Foundation will conduct necessary on the teams, and legal agreements will be entered that protect the capital provided. The Foundation will facilitate this process.
Q. Is it accurate to assume the Solver will prioritize transaction volume over profit, focusing on low fees?
A: The Solver will prioritise serving the markets needs at competitive rates. Stargate V2 as a protocol serves users who are looking for low fees, and the idea with this proposal is to capture other areas of the market - e.g. sub-second speed, or swaps.
Q: Will Stargate Bridge be the exclusive bridge for the Solver to rebalance liquidity? This should work under normal conditions with adequate liquidity in Stargate’s pools, but in cases of significant capital inflows to a specific chain, rebalancing could become expensive or infeasible.
A: Yes. Stargate should be the exclusive bridge for rebalancing unless Stargate is not able to facilitate the rebalancing. When there are significant inflows, this would not be an issue as the rebalancing will be the opposite direction of where the inflows are occurring.
Q: Will withdrawing $20 million from the treasury to fund the Solver will diminish the capacity of Stargate’s liquidity pools to meet bridging demands.
A: This $20m will be a mix of assets from DAO wallets and liquidity pools. The protocol currently has ~$500m TVL and more than sufficient liquidity to ensure its pools are able to meet bridging demands and support Hydra. The success of Hydra has put the StargateDAO in a position to consider proposals like this.
The Stargate Foundation sees this as a fundamentally valuable expansion. Fees generated from a combined bridge and swap via solver execution are materially higher than those earned through Stargate’s current pool-based transfer model. Intents-based swaps also allow Stargate to serve a broader market and unlock a new revenue stream for the DAO. By owning the full intent-swap flow, the Stargate DAO can capture value across the entire transaction funnel, whereas in external solver systems that only use Stargate for rebalancing, the DAO captures just the rebalancing fees.
Q: Will additional LP incentives be required for Stargate’s liquidity pools.
A: No. Additional LP incentives will not be required for Stragate to divert funds to bootstrap the solver. As mentioned, there is more than sufficient liquidity to meet current bridging demands.
Q: Estimated timeline?
A: Late Q3.
Q: How does this intents system position Stargate to capture market share from competitors like Across or LI.FI long-term? Will it drive net new bridge volume to scale network effects, or could it cannibalize existing pool usage?
A: This intent system positions Stargate to compete directly with other intent-based solutions by expanding beyond Transfers to also offer Swaps. It enhances Stargate’s execution stack adding intents alongside OFTs, pool-based bridging, Hydra (canonical bridging and issuance), API access, and more, delivering a complete solution for token movement.
While some flow may shift from pool-based transfers, this would primarily reflect users prioritizing speed over cost. The DAO benefits from higher-margin intent flows, and the broader adoption of intents is expected to drive significant net-new volume and network effects, far outweighing any potential cannibalization
Q: Which kind of metrics will Stargate use to assess the $20Millions intent -based system’s performance in the quarterly reports ?
A: In quarterly treasury reports to the DAO, we’ll track the average basis points (bps) earned per transaction through the solver, compared to pool-based bridging, to assess performance. Additionally, yield generated from the $20M allocation will provide insight into the solver’s overall profitability.
Q: Can you please share the exact breakdown of how the $20m will be used? What are the operational costs involved, fees that the protocol will take, etc.
A: All $20m in assets will be used as inventory for the solver to facilitate intent-based swaps.
Q: What kind of risks do you anticipate and what kind of risk mitigation processes have you put in place for this?
A: Some risks include the solver funded by Stargate not working as well as it is intended to, resulting in the potential of opportunity cost to the DAO. The Foundation will carry out extensive due diligence, as well as enter any necessary legal agreements to protect the DAO when/where possible.
Another potential risk vector involves vulnerabilities in the smart contract. To mitigate this, the Foundation will conduct thorough audits, if needed, to ensure the security and integrity of the solver’s inventory.
Q: Will the community be able to suggest or vote on which intent-based solvers get integrated? And can teams from the ecosystem apply to be part of it?
A: Absolutely - this proposal is just opening up the DAO to using capital in this manner. Token holders are the ultimate decider, and this will hopefully result in fruitful relationships for the StargateDAO.
Q: Is this $20M move just to test the waters, or does it mean Stargate is moving more seriously into intent-based bridging long-term?
A: It is not the intention of this proposal to deploy the full amount of capital in one go, rather to set up the ability for the DAO to get more seriously involved into capital provision and earning on the DAO treasury.