---
type: decision
entity_type: decision_market
name: "MetaDAO: Engage in $630,000 OTC Trade with Theia?"
domain: internet-finance
status: passed
parent_entity: "[[metadao]]"
platform: metadao
proposer: "Proph3t (on behalf of Theia)"
proposal_url: "https://v1.metadao.fi/metadao/trade/vEMYm3RaJjyuxXbD6EasE9wZpFdCNPGZi1VXt5i8cUb"
proposal_date: 2025-07-21
resolution_date: 2025-07-24
category: treasury
summary: "Proposal 14 — Theia's third OTC. 700 META at $900/token ($630K) at 38% PREMIUM to spot. Passed. Funds for legal advisory on futarchy regulatory positioning. Exhausted DAO META treasury, triggering token migration planning."
key_metrics:
  proposal_number: 14
  proposal_account: "vEMYm3RaJjyuxXbD6EasE9wZpFdCNPGZi1VXt5i8cUb"
  autocrat_version: "0.3"
  offer_amount: "$630,000 USDC"
  meta_amount: "700 META"
  price_per_meta: "$900"
  premium_to_spot: "38%"
  lock_period: "12 months linear vest"
tags: [metadao, otc, theia, institutional, legal, treasury-exhaustion, token-migration]
tracked_by: rio
created: 2026-03-24
source_archive: "inbox/archive/2025-07-21-futardio-proposal-engage-in-630000-otc-trade-with-theia.md"
---

# MetaDAO: Engage in $630,000 OTC Trade with Theia?

## Summary & Connections

**Proposal 14 — Theia's third OTC, passed at 38% premium.** 700 META at $900/token ($630K USDC). 12-month linear vest. Funds earmarked for legal advisory and runway extension. This sale exhausted the DAO's META treasury holdings.

**Outcome:** Passed (2025-07-24).

**Connections:**
- The Theia sequence demonstrates futarchy pricing evolution: rejected at discount ([[metadao-otc-trade-theia-1]], -12.7%) → accepted at premium ([[metadao-otc-trade-theia-2]], +14%) → accepted at larger premium (this, +38%). The market learned to value aligned institutional capital at a premium. Compare with [[metadao-vc-discount-rejection]] where the market rejected a VC discount — consistent pattern of accepting premium deals, rejecting discount deals.
- **Treasury exhaustion forcing function:** Proph3t's note that "this sale will exhaust the DAO treasury of META holdings" triggered token migration planning — minting new token, conversion contract, new DAO initialization. A governance mechanism that depletes its own treasury through market-approved decisions is operating as designed, but reveals a design limitation in fixed-supply governance tokens.
- **Legal funding for futarchy:** First MetaDAO treasury allocation specifically to legal infrastructure. "Futarchy has garnered attention of organizations and its use and risk of use have brought up questions no one has answered yet." Directly relevant to [[the DAO Reports rejection of voting as active management is the central legal hurdle for futarchy because prediction market trading must prove fundamentally more meaningful than token voting]]
- Theia's framing of the "Lemon Problem in Token Markets" and their Token Transparency Framework with Blockworks connects to [[ownership coins primary value proposition is investor protection not governance quality because anti-rug enforcement through market-governed liquidation creates credible exit guarantees that no amount of decision optimization can match]]

---

## Full Proposal Text

### Definitions

- MetaDAO Treasury - Squads multisig 6awyHMshBGVjJ3ozdSJdyyDE1CTAXUwrpNMaRGMsb4sf
- USDC - EPjFWdd5AufqSSqeM2qN1xzybapC8G4wEGGkZwyTDt1v
- META - METADDFL6wWMWEoKTFJwcThTbUmtarRJZjRpzUvkxhr

### Overview

- Theia wishes to acquire 700 META tokens at a USD price of $900 per token from the MetaDAO Treasury in exchange for $630,000 USDC. Importantly, this is a ~38% premium to the liquid market price of META.
- Theia is already an active partner to MetaDAO helping across multiple core areas including strategy, research, token structuring/liquidity, US policy and business development as well as by serving as an early activist in MetaDAO's futarchic markets.
- Theia's $630K investment will be used to extend runway and engage legal advisory services.
- MetaDAO will transfer the entire portion of META tokens through a 12 month linear vest Streamflow program.

### Introduction to Theia

Theia is an onchain liquid token fund manager that invests in companies building the Internet Financial System. Theia replicates traditional private investment strategies by taking large positions in small-cap tokens within under-explored parts of the market and working closely with management teams to add value. Theia typically buys liquid tokens through structured and proprietary deals, and holds investments through a two to four-year investment thesis.

Our team operates on the premise that the Internet Financial System will take share from the existing global financial system by providing innovative and increasingly efficient financial primitives that expand the design space for financial products and accelerate financialization through the Internet. The global financial system represents the largest addressable market in the world and we believe permissionless blockchain technology will expand the TAM.

Theia is a differentiated partner due to the time and expertise we commit to our portfolio companies as well as our intense focus on core infrastructure and financial applications in EVM and SVM. Our fund strategy is specifically designed to drive value for our portfolio companies; we cap our fund size, maintain a concentrated book of few investments, and seek to hold investments for many years. We work to ensure that each portfolio company has time and ample resources to realize our underwriting model forecast. This allows us to hold for the long term and ignore price fluctuations that are unrelated to business-specific catalysts.

### Theia is Focused on Token Governance

Recently, Theia has taken an active role in attempting to address and improve the problem of Onchain Token Governance. We believe this is a fundamental problem for onchain capital formation and the Internet Capital Markets thesis more broadly. Liquid investors (both fund and individual) lose hundreds of millions of dollars each year to misguided and even fraudulent governance failures. Despite a very favorable institutional and regulatory environment for crypto, We have observed a steady decline in the amount of institutional capital in liquid token markets as well as a decline in the number of businesses seeking to raise capital onchain. We believe Futarchy offers the single best solution to the problem of onchain token governance and would like to be strategic partners to MetaDAO as they bring the concept of Futarchy to market; first on Solana and then the world.

Theia describes the Lemon Problem in Token Markets at Research Day: https://x.com/TheiaResearch/status/1927536607604715671

Our essay describing the Lemon Problem in Token Markets: https://x.com/TheiaResearch/status/1935338529560662527

Theia launches Token Transparency Framework with Blockworks: https://x.com/TheiaResearch/status/1935325282497376261

### Proposal

We have enjoyed our time as partners to MetaDAO over the past six months. We believe we have been value-added partners to MetaDAO over this period, particularly by serving as thought and business partners to Proph3t and Kollan as they build MetaDAO and as active participants in MetaDAO markets. We would encourage any traders to ask Proph3t and Kollan for references on the past few months of our partnership and their expectations for our future contributions.

We are pleased to submit this offer to acquire META tokens on behalf of Theia. While this proposal outlines specific terms for a token agreement, we continue to believe that an enhanced long-term partnership between Theia and MetaDAO is the most important component of our proposal.

On behalf of Theia Blockchain Partners Master Fund LP ("Theia"), we submit a bid to acquire 700 META tokens at a USD price of $900 per token. This equates to $630,000 USDC of locked tokens at a ~38% premium to spot price at a 6-month lock.

Importantly, our investment would provide valuable capital to MetaDAO.

In general, we believe young companies should have at least 24 months of runway in case market conditions deteriorate or the business takes 1-2 years to get up and running. We believe MetaDAO is currently burning between $100K and $120K each month and has a USD treasury of $1.5M (~12.5 months of runway assuming no additional growth investments). You can confirm these numbers on MetaDAO's Transparency Report.

Importantly, we have not sold a single MetaDAO token and have accumulated a substantial open market position in META. We expect to continue increasing our position size in META through open market transactions and trading proposals. We are submitting this proposal in large part because we believe META would be worth more if the underlying business had a larger treasury of USDC.

### Proph3t and Kollan Statement

Theia's $630,000 USDC investment would be used to extend the runway and expand operating budget to engage legal for regulatory review, legal structuring and tax structuring. Futarchy has garnered attention of organizations and its use and risk of use have brought up questions no one has answered yet. It is important to understand the legal and tax landscape for continued adoption of the novel governance mechanism, futarchy.

Importantly, this sale will exhaust the DAO treasury of META holdings. It is therefore critical that we plan for the eventual token migration. This equates to minting a new token, creating a conversion contract, a UI for conversion, initializing a new DAO, creating a proposal for transfer of assets and managing the existing liquidity. If passed this proposal is a signal to the team to direct energy towards this as soon as time permits.

We're excited about the continued engagement and alignment from Theia. Onwards and upwards.

---

## Raw Data

- Proposal account: `vEMYm3RaJjyuxXbD6EasE9wZpFdCNPGZi1VXt5i8cUb`
- Proposal number: 14
- DAO account: `CNMZgxYsQpygk8CLN9Su1igwXX2kHtcawaNAGuBPv3G9`
- Proposer: `proPaC9tVZEsmgDtNhx15e7nSpoojtPD3H9h4GqSqB2`
- Autocrat version: 0.3
- Completed: 2025-07-24

## Relationship to KB
- [[metadao]] — parent entity, treasury exhaustion event
- [[metadao-otc-trade-theia-1]] — first attempt (failed, $700K at -12.7% discount)
- [[metadao-otc-trade-theia-2]] — second attempt (passed, $500K at +14% premium)
- [[theia-research]] — institutional participant
- [[the DAO Reports rejection of voting as active management is the central legal hurdle for futarchy because prediction market trading must prove fundamentally more meaningful than token voting]] — legal funding directly addresses this
- [[ownership coin treasuries should be actively managed through buybacks and token sales as continuous capital calibration not treated as static war chests]] — treasury management via OTC
- [[futarchy-daos-require-mintable-governance-tokens-because-fixed-supply-treasuries-exhaust-without-issuance-authority-forcing-disruptive-token-architecture-migrations]] — treasury exhaustion proves this claim
