Agora and Karak introduce: First-class Governance Support for (re)staked Tokens

Problem: Restaked Tokens Can't Vote Today

When protocols restake their governance tokens, they face a critical trade-off between yield generation and voting power. This creates a significant governance gap – tokens are either earning yield or participating in governance, but cannot do both. The result is reduced economic security as protocols sacrifice governance participation for returns.

This means that protocols who choose to restake their governance tokens are effectively reducing their economic security. When protocols opt to restake their tokens, they face an unnecessary trade-off:

• Either earn additional yield through restaking
• Or maintain their governance rights and protocol security

This creates a significant barrier to adoption for protocols considering restaking, as they must choose between economic benefits and governance participation.

Current Solutions Are Inadequate

The existing solutions rely on middleware contracts that introduce unnecessary complexity. Each protocol requires custom integration work, resulting in increased gas costs, additional attack surfaces, and poor user experience.This presents several challenges:

1. Complex Integration Requirements
   • Multiple contract deployments needed
   • Custom integration work for each protocol
   • Higher risk of implementation errors
2. Poor User Experience
   • Complicated transaction flows
   • Higher gas costs due to additional contract interactions
   • Confusing interface for end users
3. Limited Standardization
   • Each solution uses different interfaces
   • Lack of common best practices
   • Poor interoperability between protocols

Our Solution: Native Governance Support

We've partnered with Karak to integrate governance at the token standard level. By implementing OpenZeppelin's ERC20Votes interface natively in Karak's contracts, all assets restaked through Karak are governance-enabled at deployment. No middleware. No additional steps. Just efficient voting power for restaked assets.

This approach establishes governance as a core primitive: restaked tokens retain their voting rights without introducing additional complexity or vulnerabilities.

Key Features

1. Native Integration
   • Direct implementation of Votes interface
   • No additional contracts required
   • Seamless governance participation
2. Standard Compliance
   • Full compatibility with OpenZeppelin standards
   • Works with existing governance systems
   • Future-proof implementation
3. Improved User Experience
   • One-step restaking and governance activation
   • Lower gas costs
   • Simplified interface

Benefits

1. For Protocols
   • Immediate governance compatibility
   • No additional development work
   • Reduced security risks
2. For Users
   • Simple, one-step process
   • Lower transaction costs
   • Familiar governance interface
3. For the Ecosystem
   • Standardized implementation
   • Better interoperability
   • Improved security

Next Steps

We're committed to making governance accessible for all restaked assets. Our roadmap includes:

• Additional governance features
• Multi-chain support
• Advanced delegation mechanisms
• Enhanced analytics and reporting

Contact us:

• Email: partnerships@agora.xyz
• Twitter: @AgoraProtocol
• Discord: discord.gg/agora

Join us in building the future of DeFi governance, where economic security and governance participation go hand in hand.