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What is Gnosis (GNO)?
Luis Clark
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Luis Clark
What is Gnosis?
GnosisDAO builds decentralized infrastructure for the Ethereum Ecosystem. GNO serves as the native token of the Gnosis ecosystem. It is used for staking on the Gnosis Beacon Chain and acts as the governance token for the GnosisDAO.
As a DAO, Gnosis uses the products that it creates to transparently guide decisions on the development, support, and governance of its ecosystem.
Gnosis Safe (multi-sig and programmable account), Cow Protocol (formerly Gnosis Protocol and CowSwap), Gnosis Auction,Conditional Tokens (prediction markets), and Zodiac (standard and tooling for composable DAOs) are products incubated by Gnosis. Their success is demonstrated by the previous spin-out of Cow Protocol and the formation of SafeDAO. By combining needs-driven development with profound technical expertise, Gnosis has helped to build the decentralized infrastructure for the Ethereum ecosystem.
In November 2021, both the xDAI and GnosisDAO community voted to combine their thriving ecosystems to create the Gnosis Chain: an EVM-compatible, community-owned network that prioritizes credible neutrality and resiliency. The network uses the xDai token and includes a wide-ranging group of projects and users. Gnosis Chain is secured by over 100k validators worldwide. Using the same execution and consensus layer clients as Ethereum, Gnosis Chain is compatible with all future EIPs.”
Who is the Founder?
Gnosis was co-founded in 2015 by Stefan George and Martin Koeppelmann as a part of the ConsenSys brand, an Ethereum venture production studio. Friederike Ernst joined as a co-founder shortly thereafter. However, in 2017, Gnosis raised enough funds to come out from ConsenSys as an independent brand.
Stefan George, before starting Gnosis founded the centralized Bitcoin prediction market fairlay.com.
How does Gnosis (GNO) Work?
The Gnosis ecosystem has several components that help to improve the utility of Ethereum.
CoW Protocol
The CoW Protocol is a permissionless decentralized exchange (DEX) that enables users to swap any ERC-20 token – the fungible token standard developed by the Ethereum ecosystem – for another.
The CoW Protocol is unique because it matches and settles trades on the platform. Rather than using an automated market maker system (AMM) where users provide liquidity for others to trade against, the CoW Protocol matches buyers and sellers using multi-token batch auctions. It settles trades at the best available price.
Batch auctions work by grouping buy and sell orders every five minutes. Other users can then compete to provide the best order settlement for the batch of trades. This is referred to as “solving”, and anyone who does this on the protocol is dubbed a “solver.”
Solving protects traders against miner extractable value (MEV) — the maximum value a miner can receive from producing a block over and above the usual block reward and gas fees.
Because each batch of orders will most likely contain a range of different tokens – such as DAI/USDC, LINK/WETH or GNO/USDT – a method called ring trading is used to settle them. This means that rather than clearing trades based on matching identical trading pairs, liquidity can be sourced from any order in the batch to complete the transactions.
Safe
Safe (formerly Gnosis Safe) is a customizable multi-signature wallet infrastructure suitable for enterprises and individuals. It is a smart contract wallet on the Ethereum network that requires a prespecified minimum number of approvals for the transaction to occur.
For instance, a business with four main stakeholders can set up a wallet requiring a minimum of three stakeholders to approve a transaction before it is sent.
This gives users an increased level of security and means if one stakeholder’s private key to the wallet is lost or compromised, the funds are not at risk and can be retrieved by the remaining stakeholders.
Safe supports Ether (ETH), ERC-20 tokens and ERC-721 (NFTs) and can interact with several DeFi platforms.
Gnosis Chain and Gnosis Beacon Chain
Gnosis Chain is the execution-layer Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) chain and utilises the xDAI stablecoin to facilitate transactions and pay for transaction fees. The network itself is secured by the consensus layer, called the Gnosis Beacon Chain (GBC). The GBC uses a Proof-of-Stake system – similar to Cardano and Solana – whereby users lock up GNO tokens to participate in the transaction validation process and thereby accrue additional GNO tokens as a reward for helping to secure the network.
GnosisDAO
GnosisDAO is the collective steward of the Gnosis ecosystem, formed in late 2020.
Over time, the GnosisDAO treasury has hundreds of thousands of ETH and millions of GNO tokens, with the GNO tokens vesting over eight years.
The governance process is conducted through the GnosisDAO category on the Gnosis forum https://forum.gnosis.io/. For a proposal to be approved in GnosisDAO, it must pass through three phases successfully.
Phase 1: Ideation
The Ideation phase initiates an informal discussion on Gnosis Forum concerning prospective proposals to GnosisDAO. The time frame or duration for this phase is open-ended.
Users can initiate a phase 1 proposal by posting their idea in the GnosisDAO with a phase-1 label. This first phase aims to gather enough community insight for refinement before a formal poll is opened.
If the discussion for the proposal doesn’t get enough attention from the community, the proposal may not be successful. There are no formal requirements for phase 1 proposals to pass the next phase.
Phase 2: Specification
A proposal must be posted in the GnosisDAO category if it makes it to the second phase. The proposal must use the Gnosis Improvement Proposal (GIP) 131 template. The template can be easily created by adding the GIP subcategory. Once you do this, the GIP template will automatically populate your draft post. You are expected to fill in all the required information.
Fields in the GIP template that must be addressed include Motivation, Abstract, Implementation, Specification, and a Simple Summary.
The duration for Phase 2 proposals is five days. The proposal must have a 5-day forum poll about the proposed outcome. The poll must include the option “Make no Changes”.
For proposals to move from Phase 2 to Phase 3, there must be an outcome with a relative majority of votes on the forum poll. If, however, the majority of votes on the forum poll indicate “Make no changes”, the proposal will be moved to Phase 3.
Phase 3: Consensus
This is the final phase of a proposal. Proposals in this phase are opened to 2 signalling methods for token holders. The duration for this phase is seven days.
Proposals can be moved to Phase 3 by editing the Phase 2 GIP post to reflect the result of the forum poll. The proposal tag should also be updated to phase 3.
A GnosisDAO snapshot poll, 107 polls, must be created in this phase. This should contain the proposal text and a link to the GIP post on the Gnosis Forum. The “Make no changes” option must also be included. The GnosisDAO snapshot poll should be added to the GIP post.
For a proposal to be approved in Phase 3, there must be one outcome. A relative majority of GNO used to signal on the GnosisDAO snapshot poll must be accompanied by a yes-voting quorum of a minimum of four percent of the circulating supply of GNO.
If the majority of GNO used the signal “Make no Changes”, the proposal will be rejected and closed.
Weaknesses of Gnosis
Just like most cryptocurrencies, GNO is easily affected by the high volatility of the crypto market. This has affected people’s interest in investing in the token.
How is Gnosis (GNO) Created?
GNO cannot be mined, as creating new blocks to receive rewards is impossible. At its launch, the Gnosis team minted 10 million GNO. These tokens were then sold in an ICO event back in 2017. However, the current circulating supply is 2.6 million tokens and the maximum total supply is set at 3 million tokens.
Mining Gnosis (GNO)
All available Gnosis tokens have been minted so it isn’t possible to mine GNO (create new blocks).
Which Blockchain does Gnosis (GNO) Use?
Gnosis (GNO) is an ERC-20 token developed on the Ethereum blockchain.
How to Use Gnosis?
GNO token is the ERC-20 token used to operate the Gnosis platform and governance. GNO is Ethereum based, and 10 million GNO was sold during the Gnosis ICO.
How to Buy Gnosis (GNO)?
Gnosis is traded on many top cryptocurrency exchanges like Binance, Kraken, Bitrue, Gate.io, Coinbase, and Huobi Global. A simple search on CoinMarketCap will also show a comprehensive list of all the decentralized exchanges that support Gnosis.
The process of buying Gnosis on these exchanges is quite straightforward. But you will need to have a profile or an account with a centralized exchange to buy Gnosis. It is also possible to swap other digital tokens for GNO on decentralized exchanges like Uniswap.
You can buy Gnosis directly using fiat currencies like USD or with another cryptocurrency. If you decide to buy Gnosis with another cryptocurrency, you must purchase the other crypto and then use it to buy it. This process is usually longer and more stressful than the fiat option.
While most exchanges may have different requirements for opening an account with them, buying Gnosis is similar across all platforms. Each step may have some slight disparity, but the result is the same.
Below are the steps for buying Gnosis on most exchanges:
- Create an account on your preferred exchange.
- Add a payment method and activate the payment method.
- If you want to buy Gnosis with another crypto, buy the cryptocurrency.
- If you are buying Gnosis with fiat currency, skip the previous step.
- Start a trade
- A list of assets will be displayed; select Gnosis.
- Enter the amount you wish to purchase.
- The trade will be finalized when you make the payment.
Regardless of your platform, your Gnosis token should reflect in your account immediately after you pay and finalize the trade.
How to Store Gnosis (GNO)?
GNO can be stored in any ERC-20 compatible wallet. While there are a lot of software and hardware wallets to choose from, it is best if you save GNO in its native wallet known as Safe Wallet (previously Gnosis Safe).
The Gnosis safe Safe Wallet is a multi-signature smart contract wallet that runs on several blockchains. It enables users to define a list of signer accounts and a threshold number of signers needed to confirm a transaction. This wallet is perfect for businesses that wish to store their GNO. The multi-signature feature prevents one person from compromising the crypto assets. Transactions are only approved when the threshold of owner accounts has confirmed the transaction.
As stated earlier, there are other wallets, asides from the Gnosis Safe Wallet, that support GNO. This includes hardware wallets like Trezor Model One and Ledger Nano wallets. Hardware wallets are the best for storing cryptocurrencies because they are less susceptible to hacking attacks.
Best Place to Stake Gnosis (GNO)
Delegated mGNO token staking
Delegated Staking is working towards Ankr Network 2.0, bringing together the ecosystem of Ankr developers, node providers (Node Pros), and stakers (Ankr Bankrs) in a way that offers everyone involved with Ankr a more rewarding experience.
With ANKR teaming up with Gnosis they can offer a new staking product that is entirely trustless and non-custodial. Gnosis staking allows users to stake their mGNO, making more profit from their assets.
megaGnosis or mGNO is part of the Gnosis Protocol and an infrastructure for open finance. From a user’s perspective, a complete trading cycle on Gnosis Protocol consists of three user actions: deposit, order, and withdrawal. mGNO specifically is a meta token for GNO, a Gnosis token. The relation is similar to a wrapped token like WETH to ETH, except there is a 32 mGNO to 1 GNO ratio.
mGNO staking offers the opportunity of staking with Ankr, and as the Ankr Network 2.0 expands, you can choose between different APYs that various Node Providers offer.
To stake mGNO, you’ll need to:
- Purchase GNO (on Ethereum).
- Bridge GNO to Gnosis.
- Convert the bridged GNO to mGNO.
- Connect your wallet at Ankr Staking.
- Stake mGNO at Ankr.
Gnosis Chain users can also mint sGNO when they stake GNO / mGNO tokens and earn up to 18% APR wherever they go in the ecosystem. Staking rewards accrue daily in rGNO tokens, which can be reinvested into the GBC for a compounding effect.
You can initiate staking your GNO & mGNO at: app.stakewise.io.
Further information can be found at www.validategnosis.com.
What You Need to Know about the Future of Gnosis (GNO)?
The GNO token derives its value from its role in facilitating the operation of the Gnosis network. This means that the token’s future depends on the widespread acceptance of the platform. If the upcoming projects positively impact the platform’s acceptability, it will directly affect the token’s price.
Conclusion: Should You Put Your Money in Gnosis (GNO)?
Concerning the Gnosis price predictions, there are varying opinions from experts. This means there is no global consensus about the negative or positive future of Gnosis price movements.
That said, the possible growth of the GNO token in the future depends on various factors such as project announcements, new technological solutions, and the state of the crypto industry. So before you put money into GNO, ensure that you are well abreast with the correct happenings of the platform and the crypto space. And ensure that you do your own research.
Risk in Investing in Gnosis (GNO)
Cryptocurrencies are volatile investments, and GNO is no exception. So only invest funds that you’re willing to lose in the worst-case scenario.
Our extensive analysis of the different Cryptocurrencies doesn’t stop here. You can also check out our “What is ADAPAD?” guide to know more about another huge project.
FAQ
Most frequent questions and answers
The GNO coin was launched on April 24th, 2017.
Yes, Gnosis was developed on the Ethereum blockchain.
GnosisDAO aims to build decentralized infrastructure for the Ethereum Ecosystem.
No, but Gnosis Chain, one of the projects of Gnosis, is a sidechain to Ethereum. Gnosis Chain is an EVM-compatible, community-owned network that prioritizes credible neutrality and resiliency, open to everyone without privilege or prejudice. Over 100k validators around the world secure Gnosis Chain. It’s native token is XDai.
Gnosis is based in Gibraltar.
There is a total supply of about 3 million Gnosis GNO tokens. All Gnosis coins were pre-mined, so the project has a fixed supply.
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