​Arbitrum developers announce the launch and airdrop of the native token ARB

What’s new? The developers of Arbitrum, a layer 2 (L2) solution for scaling the Ethereum blockchain, have announced the launch of the native token ARB. In addition, the Arbitrum team will conduct an airdrop of the new token among its users on March 23. Unlike Ethereum, which is used to pay rewards, the ARB token will only be used to govern the protocol. The governance process of the Arbitrum DAO will be self-executing, votes can be used to directly modify Arbitrum’s core code.

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The Abritrum network, developed by Offchain Labs, uses Optimistic Rollup technology to aggregate large packets of off-network transactions from Ethereum smart contracts and decentralized applications (DApps) before sending them to Ethereum. The solution is designed to increase Ethereum’s speed and scalability.

What else is known? According to the Arbitrum Foundation, the launch of ARB marks the official transition of Arbitrum into a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO), which means that ARB holders will be able to vote on key decisions governing Arbitrum One and Arbitrum Nova, networks that allow users to make transactions on the Ethereum blockchain with greater speeds and lower fees.

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“Arbitrum DAO will have the power to control key decisions at the core protocol level, from how the chain's technology is upgraded to how the revenue from the chain can be used to support the ecosystem,” the Arbitrum Foundation said.

Although 44% of the tokens will be allocated to investors and core participants in the project, the team says the ARB token launch will make the Arbitrum ecosystem more decentralized than alternative solutions for scaling.

“For me, the most exciting part is the decentralization – the fact that Offchain Labs will no longer have any control over the future of this chain. We will be a service provider, and if the DAO calls on us to build software, we will,” Offchain Labs CEO Steven Goldfeder told CoinDesk.

Arbitrum is working with analytics company Nansen to select the users among whom ARB will be airdropped. The number of tokens received will depend on user activity in February, including the number of transactions made and applications used. Arbitrum users will be able to check their eligibility for the airdrop at gov.arbitrum.foundation.

The total volume of ARB issuance will be 10 billion. The Arbitrum community will control 56% of those tokens. The airdrop will result in 11,5% of the total volume going to Arbitrum’s eligible users and 1,1% to DAOs who work in the Arbitrum ecosystem. The remaining community tokens will go to a treasury controlled by the new Arbitrum DAO, which will allow ARB holders to vote on the distribution of funds.

Changes to the code based on votes will be time delayed (to leave time for audits and other security measures), but the 12-person security council controlled by the Arbitrum DAO will have the ability to quickly correct bugs.

As for the remaining 44% of ARB, which will go to investors and Offchain Labs employees, these tokens will be subject to lock-up periods and vesting schedules.

The introduction of ARB was timed to coincide with the launch of Arbitrum Obit, which will allow third-party applications and protocols to create new Level 3 (L3) blockchains based on Arbitrum’s low-fee infrastructure.

In February, MetaMask wallet added support for Arbitrum and Optimism networks to its bridge aggregator. And on March 2, the value of ARBI, the native token of the decentralized exchange (DEX) ArbiSwap based on Arbitrum, plummeted by 99,9%, from $1,5 to $0,00000001223. More than $136 000 was withdrawn from the liquidity pools. Representatives of the crypto community accused the exchange team of fraud using the Rug Pull scheme.