It has been nearly 3 years since MakerDAO was first formed. We started as a small team with a big vision of building a decentralized digital global economy that was fair, transparent and efficient. It’s truly inspiring to see how far the community has come through this powerful grassroots movement.

We realized early on that a decentralized digital economy needs a stablecoin to function, a cryptocurrency that has low volatility against the world’s most important national currencies, unlocking large benefits for the entire Internet.

Our team has been hard at work to bring you Dai, an asset-backed, hard currency for the 21st century — the first fully-decentralized stablecoin on Ethereum.

We are excited to share that stablecoin Dai has officially launched on the Ethereum Mainnet.

How does Dai work?

1 Dai is worth $1 USD.

The essential stability property is continuously maintained through an autonomous system of smart contracts specifically designed to respond to market dynamics. No one, MakerDAO included, can alter the core mechanics of Dai, making it a safe and predictable form of money.

Each Dai is backed by some valuable asset held in a decentralized manner in the secure Maker smart contract platform. MakerDAO does not control any of them. Anyone can lock their tokens up as collateral and issue Dai against them. To create Dai, you send Ether to a Collateralized Debt Position (CDP) on the Maker platform.

Many financial products such as hedging, leveraging, longs and shorts rely on a central trusted actor to hold your contract. With Dai, individuals can take long positions in ETH in a completely decentralized manner. Additional financial products can be built upon this mechanism. The Dai Stablecoin System allows for opportunities for both profit-seeking traders and stability-seeking holders to participate in a fair, decentralized marketplace.

Market-based dapps will directly benefit from the launch of Dai, enabling the ecosystem to approach a new age of usability. We are excited to spearhead this modern evolution of money, starting with Dai.

Learn More

• • Learn about how to interact with the Dai platform.

• • Read our updated whitepaper to learn more about the exact design and features that you can look forward to with Dai.

• Connect with us at chat.makerdao.com

Best,

The MakerDAO Team