$AMPL — The Undisputed King of Rebase Tokens
According to CoinGecko, there are 23 rebasing tokens and none come even close to $AMPL’s market cap.
Do you know why?
Cause like Bitcoin, $AMPL is the pioneer of its own asset class — MultiVariable assets or MVA's if you like.
$AMPL is the first rebasing currency to ever exist. $AMPL is the most successful rebase token implementation. $AMPL is the undisputed king of rebase tokens. Period.
I don’t say these words lightly… I really mean them.
You know, there were many attempts to create a better AMPL yet everyone failed along the way.
Heck, even the Ampleforth team itself tried different approaches:
Bonds, coupons, fractional reserve; all these mechanisms for so-called “algorithmic stablecoins” simply do not work.
Brandon Iles, Evan Kuo, and their team tried and tested the mechanisms that other algorithmic stablecoins are using today, but never had enough faith in their resiliency to actually launch with them.
As stated by Kuo in response to the Tweet above:
Now, here’s the thing: a risk-free asset does NOT exist. Not even the Dollar, or GBP, or Yen, or Euro in your wallet is risk-free in this rapidly changing world.
$AMPL’s founders realized that and are the reason why $AMPL is designed in such a way.
And guess what?
It works. It actually works.
The decentralized and censorship-resistant Ampleforth protocol automatically adjusts the supply in response to demand so that $AMPL’s price and stabilization can be 100% sustained by free-market incentives.
Since $AMPL went live on Ethereum’s mainnet, it has been running without issues, without intervention (Kucoin hack is a different thing) , and on average, it has maintained its target price of $1.03 (the 2019 CPI-adjusted US Dollar).
Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for other “algorithmic stablecoins”.
Why other Projects that try to Mitigate the Risk Completely have Failed
I love this ultra IQ quote from Brandon Iles:
“Groups will keep trying to build a risk-free algo-stablecoin, but a risk-free stablecoin is like a perpetual motion machine.”
“Just as energy can’t be created, risk can’t be destroyed. It can at best be re-assigned, hopefully as transparently and fairly as possible.”
The takeaway:
You simply can’t build a risk-free asset. Period. Yet this is what most of the so-called “algorithmic stablecoin” projects are trying to do… and that’s why they fail.
Even Ampleforth, (before they launched $AMPL), designed an algorithmic stablecoin protocol called Fragments which had 3 mechanics at its core: Bonds, Fractional Reserve, and Rebase.
According to Brandon, they never launched it because two of those mechanics (Bonds and Fractional Reserve) would eventually fail:
Apparently, other algorithmic stablecoin projects didn’t get the memo, because most of them still use different variations of Bonds and Fractional Reserve to form the basis of their protocol.
A few core examples of these failed algorithmic stablecoins are:
Basis Cash — Uses an algorithmic central bank that issues bonds/coupons which can be bought and redeemed for the stablecoin when the price goes below or above the $1.00 price target.
Empty Set Dollar — Uses coupons that are priced at a discount and can only be bought by burning ESD, shrinking the supply.
Dynamic Set Dollar — Uses coupons, but the premium from the discount is calculated depending on the debt ratio in the protocol.
Go ahead and click on any of these links to see by yourself, the actual price of so-called algorithmic stablecoins.
Why $AMPL Remains as the King
$AMPL remains as the undisputed king of rebase tokens because it has no collateral, it has no bonds/coupons, it has no fractional reserve or algorithmic central bank, it has no tradeoffs, and it’s not a risk-free asset.
$AMPL is just pure math and driven by 100% free-market incentives.
Its rebase mechanism sufficiently trades price volatility for supply volatility which then drives liquidity from free-market arbitrators who can capitalize on supply changes, which subsequently stabilizes the $AMPL price.
It really is a simple, beautiful, and carefully thought-out design that just works.
$AMPL’s elastic supply and rebasing mechanics do an excellent job at maintaining $AMPL price stability while at the same time, driving interest and demand from the free market, which translates to an increasing market cap, making $AMPL the undisputed king.
Conclusion
As the undisputed king of rebasing tokens, $AMPL is destined for great things.
Great customer service, free parking spots, 10/10 can recommend.
If you can’t already see that, make sure you stay with me and read my next article where I’ll explore the bullish case for $AMPL and how you (the free market) can capitalize on its bullishness.
