teleo-codex/decisions/internet-finance/sanctum-build-mobile-app-wonder.md

type	entity_type	name	domain	status	parent_entity	platform	proposer	proposal_url	proposal_date	resolution_date	category	summary	tracked_by	created
decision	decision_market	Sanctum: Should Sanctum build a Sanctum Mobile App (Wonder)?	internet-finance	failed	sanctum	futardio	Sanctum team	https://v1.metadao.fi/sanctum/trade/2frDGSg1frwBeh3bc6R7XKR2wckyMTt6pGXLGLPgoota	2025-03-28	2025-03-31	strategy	Sanctum proposed building mobile app 'Wonder' as crypto consumer onboarding product — team reserved discretion but put strategic direction to futarchy vote. Failed.	rio	2026-03-24

Sanctum: Should Sanctum build a Sanctum Mobile App (Wonder)?

Summary

Sanctum proposed building a mobile app codenamed "Wonder" — a consumer-facing crypto onboarding product targeting non-speculative users who want yield, community, and a delightful UX. Despite not involving community CLOUD funds, the team put this product direction to futarchy vote as "the largest product decision ever made by the Sanctum team." Core features: automatic yield on assets, gasless trades, fiat offramps, curated project discovery (including potential MetaDAO launchpad integration). Revenue models: AUM fees, swap fees, subscription fees. The proposal failed, suggesting the market preferred the team focus on core B2B staking infrastructure.

Market Data

• Outcome: Failed
• Proposer: Sanctum team
• Proposal Account: 2frDGSg1frwBeh3bc6R7XKR2wckyMTt6pGXLGLPgoota
• Duration: 2025-03-28 to ~2025-03-31

Strategic Context

• Opportunity cost acknowledged: Building mobile app diverts resources from core B2B staking business and institutional liquid staking
• Competitive reference: Phantom ($3B valuation), Jupiter ($1.7B market cap / $6.2B FDV), MetaMask ($320M swap fees, Consensys $2.3B secondary)
• Target users: "Good (agentic, integrous, open-minded, earnest) people" — not memecoin traders
• Go-to-market: Closed beta with top CLOUD stakers (by staking score), invite codes, iterate to find killer feature
• Team reserved discretion to modify features and go-to-market

Significance

This is the most consequential use of futarchy for strategic product direction rather than treasury allocation. The team explicitly chose to put a major strategic pivot to market vote despite having no obligation to do so ("this is not a proposal that involves community CLOUD funds"). The failure demonstrates futarchy's ability to override team preferences on strategic direction — the market effectively told the team to stay focused on core infrastructure. This supports the claim that coin price is the fairest objective function for asset futarchy since token holders optimized for protocol value by rejecting a risky pivot.

The "curate the best, most aligned projects — MetaDAO launchpad integration?" bullet is particularly notable as an early signal of Sanctum exploring the MetaDAO ecosystem as a distribution channel.

Relationship to KB

• sanctum — product strategy governance decision
• coin price is the fairest objective function for asset futarchy — market rejected team's strategic preference
• futarchy-markets-can-reject-solutions-to-acknowledged-problems-when-the-proposed-solution-creates-worse-second-order-effects-than-the-problem-it-solves — opportunity cost of pivot outweighed potential
• sanctum-wonder-mobile-app-proposal-failed-futarchy-vote-march-2025 — existing claim about this event

Full Proposal Text

Source: futard.io, tabled 2025-03-28

tl;dr

This proposal would empower the Sanctum team to build a Sanctum mobile app, codenamed "Wonder". Even though this is not a proposal that involves community CLOUD funds, this is going to be the largest product decision ever made by the Sanctum team, so we want to put it up to governance vote. We're excited about this direction but still want to gut check with the community.

what

Our goal is to onboard more good (agentic, integrous, open-minded, earnest) people onto the magical new world of crypto. Wonder would be a mobile app that maximally serves these users.

Why would these users want to be on chain? They are unlikely to want to trade memecoins. But they would be interested in earning/raising money on crypto to fund their ambitions, holding assets with long-term real yield, and participating, belonging, and interacting with other like-minded people.

Core goals of Wonder:

• to make the new user UX safe and easy (no seed phrases)
• to put people first (profiles, not wallet addresses), and
• to maximise love, fun, and delight

(potential) core product features:

• automatically gives you great yields on your assets
• shows you how much money you've made from your yield-bearing assets (SOL, JUP, CLOUD, USDC)
• gasless trades/transfers
• lets you spend and offramp your money via card or bank transfer
• curates the best, most aligned projects so you can participate or invest in them
  • MetaDAO launchpad integration?

potential monetisation models:

• AUM fees on deposits
• swap fees
• subscription fees

why

The Business Case:

• There's immense value in products that touch the end-user. Google, Netflix, Amazon, Zillow, and Expedia all capture substantial value through being "the place the user comes to when they want to explore." Wonder would do the same for crypto.
• Abnormal profits come from pricing power. And pricing power comes from consumers having a reason not to switch to alternatives. Consumers, especially in financial services, are sticky and prefer to stick to what they already know.
• The market has recognized this opportunity. Phantom recently raised at a $3B valuation. Jupiter trades at a $1.7B market cap and $6.2B FDV. MetaMask made $320M in swap fees and is one of the reasons why Consensys is worth $2.3B in secondary markets.

Team: We have a track record of making things fun, building delightful products, simplifying very complex concepts. We made futarchy fun and accessible. I mean we made liquid staking fun for gods sake. At the same time, we have a reputation for competence and safety — today, Sanctum safeguards over 1B in funds.

Personal: A month ago I saw my 17 year old cousin open up his phone. He was trading TRUMP on Moonshot, looking at his portfolio go from $6 to $4.60 (lol). I was really happy that crypto has conclusively come to the mainstream, but also sad that that was his first experience with crypto. Crypto has a lot more to offer than trading memecoins, but it seems like everyone is focused on building apps for that. I want to build the right introduction to crypto: the app we all deserve, but no one is building.

go-to-market

The goal is to build out a minimally delightful product with just one killer feature — but some iteration will be required to find that feature. To get our first users, we'll run a very intimate, high-touch closed beta with our best cloudmen (probably initiated by staking score) — each of them would have some small numbers of invite codes. We'll use that to iterate on the product and find that killer feature. Once we are sure we have a compelling product and hook, we'll look to distribute to the broader crypto audience.

considerations

The largest consideration here is opportunity cost. Building this mobile app will require significant resources and will affect to some degree our focus on scale the core business. The alternative is to stay the course and focus solely on growing Sanctum as a B2B staking business or going into institutional liquid staking (more CEXes, building out custodial products, locked SOL, etc.) Other considerations include: building mobile consumer apps is notoriously hard, and value capture is not completely clear, especially if we don't focus on capturing the users which have max trading volumes.

discretion

The Sanctum core team reserves the right to change details of the prospective features or go-to-market if we deem it better for the product.