Frequently Asked Questions
General Questions
Q: What is AuraBAL?
A: AuraBAL is the liquid wrapper token you obtain when locking the 80BAL20ETH Balancer Pool Token (BPT) on Aura Finance that gives yield exposure to veBAL while, at the same time, not locking the BPT for one year.
Q: What can be done with AuraBAL?
Once minted, AuraBAL can be either staked or staked and auto compounded into more AuraBAL, in the compounder to earn 20.5% of all BAL revenue generated by LPs on Aura and veBAL fees, in addition to AURA. Alternatively, AuraBAL can be LPed in the corresponding auraBAL Stable Pool (auraBAL/80BAL20ETH) on Balancer and then further staked in the corresponding Aura pool.
Q: How often are earnings updated? Why am I staking my BPT on Aura, but I don't get anything?
A: Block by block. Sometimes if rewards aren’t flowing, the harvest may need to be called for this pool. Those that call this function are incentivized by 0.5% of the harvested BAL amount.
Q: What is the bootstrapping phase of a pool?
A: The Aura and BAL rewards of a pool are streamed over a period of time, and thus it takes some time for a newly deployed pool to achieve its projected APR. This is referred to as the bootstrapping phase.
Q: Are rewards for an Aura pool accumulating while it is in a bootstrapping phase?
A: Yes
Q: How long is the bootstrapping phase for an Aura pool?
A: ~1 week
Q: After a vlAURA gauge vote closes, when do emissions start?
A: The emissions are gradually streamed for ~1 week (smart contract reward period), starting at 00:00 UTC on Wednesdays following the close of a vlAURA gauge vote.
Q: How often are vlAura gauge votes?
A: Once every 2 weeks. Voting is via Snapshot, commences at 2 am UTC on Thursdays, and closes at 2 am UTC on Mondays.
Q: How often are veBAL gauge votes?
A: Once every week. Voting is onchain, commences at 0:00 UTC on Thursdays and closes at immediately before 0:00 UTC on Wednesdays.
Q: When do emissions start after each veBAL vote?
A: BAL emission epochs start each Thursday at 00:00 UTC.
Q: How often can I change my veBAL gauge vote
A: Once every 10 days.
Q: What is the difference between Aura’s projected APR vs. the current APR?
A: Projected APR is a combination of different variables, such as the price of the assets in the pool and the current reward rate according to veBAL and vlAURA gauge votes, but it is not always accurate.
This is because gauge votes happen each week via veBAL and once every two weeks via vlAURA, determining the BAL/Aura emissions. However, emissions scale up and down slowly as Aura and BAL rewards are streamed to their pools: it usually takes a few days, up to a week, to reach the projected APR, assuming the staked amount in the pool stays constant. That’s why there is a projected APR section.
The current APR is based on Aura smart contract data (i.e., rewardRate field in pool contracts). Rewards lag slightly and take a ~week to accrue/ramp up, so there will be a short period where Aura BAL APR < current Balancer BAL APR. The projected APR is the rate from Balancer (basically the target APR).
Q: How long does it take for Aura’s projected APR to catch up with the current APR?
A: ~one week if all parameters stay the same: vote weight, pool TVL, and relative TVL between Aura’s veBAL and other veBAL holders.
Q: Why is the current Aura APR stuck at a low value?
A: APRs take ~7 days to ramp up once emissions start coming in (smart contract reward period); if a pool hasn't had rewards before, the APR will be low for the first 7 days.
In a high gas scenario, APRs might decrease if the pool emissions are too low for third-party harvesters to trigger reward earmarking. In this scenario, rewards are still being accrued, just a little delayed.
Q: How can I harvest rewards for the liquidity I provided in a pool? A: in the page of the pool, click on “info” and select “Harvest gauge rewards”.
Q: Does 1 vlAURA = 1 veBAL?
A: It is possible that this is the case, though likely not. It is a function of locked vlAURA vs. the veBAL owned by Aura. These dashboards can provide more detailed information:
https://dune.com/0xahtle7/aura-finance-dashboard
https://dune.com/aura_finance/aura
Integrations
Q: Where do I check emissions / $1 spent on Aura gauge incentives?
A: The value of emissions per $1 spent on voting incentives is tied to the reference voting incentive markets. For Hidden Hand, this value can be found here: https://llama.airforce/#/bribes/overview/hh/aura-bal
Q: Why has voting incentive efficiency increased/decreased?
A: This can be caused by several factors :
Total veBAL or vlAura supply changes according to users’ unlock schedules
Price volatility of BAL and Aura which impacts the total value of emissions
Volatility of price between tokens distributed as voting incentives and BAL or Aura over the epoch
% of veBAL supply locked within the AuraBAL wrapper, which impacts $Aura emissions
Total value of incentives available for voters
Q: How do I set up a Balancer gauge?
A: The balancer gauge can be requested using the following guide posted on the Balancer forum: https://forum.balancer.fi/t/instructions-overview/2674
Q: My token is rebasing. How do I create liquidity for it on Balancer?
A: Balancer vault does not support rebasing tokens; to create liquidity, one needs to create a wrapper of the rebasing token.
Q: How does Balancer Boost work?
A: If a pool is eligible to receive liquidity mining incentives through a gauge, the liquidity providers (LPs) of this pool must stake their BPT tokens to be able to receive their share of this incentive. This is the staking reward.
To boost this value, they must also hold veBAL. The amount of veBAL held will define how much the boost will be.
The math behind how much the veBAL held will boost the base rewards is shown here:
For more information, please refer to this page: **** https://docs.balancer.fi/reference/vebal-and-gauges/boost-calculations.html
Observation: When the BPT is deposited in Aura, the boost is calculated using Aura’s position of veBAL and usually gives more boost than individual veBAL voting.
Q: My pool’s gauge boost has decreased or is low. Is there any way we can raise this?
A: This happened because the veBAL% voting for this pool decreased (or was not high enough). The way to raise it is to have more veBAL voting power directed to the pool. This can be done in two ways:
Purchase veBAL to vote in your pool;
Incentivize veBAL holders to vote in your pool.
Q: I just participated in the last round and allocated voting incentives for my pool. Why hasn’t the pool started receiving rewards?
A: If the pool is on layer 2 (such as Arbitrum, Optimism, etc), the BAL incentives have a one-week delay due to the bridge process. If the pool is on Ethereum, most likely, there is yet a harvest of the Aura staking pool.
Q: What are core pools?
A: Core pools were established by [BIP-19] and are Pools that contain at least 50% yield-bearing tokens that Balancer earns a fee on. On Ethereum Mainnet and L2s such as Polygon and Arbitrum, core pools use 65% of the fees they generate, including interest-bearing yield, as bribes on Hidden Hand for every two-week veBAL gauge cycle and the gauge for any other system that controls more than 20% of veBAL (currently just Aura).
Q: Should I apply for my token liquidity to be designated as a core pool?
A: Unless your pool’s parameters and paired assets fit with the criteria of core pools described in the question above, it is not appropriate to apply for it.
Q: When is Aura launching on Arbitrum/Optimism/Polygon etc…
A: Aura is launching on Arbitrum very soon (mid to late June). Optimism and other L2 deployments will follow.
Q: Can Aura speak on my Twitter space/Youtube channel/Podcast etc…?
A: Unfortunately, the Aura contributors do not engage in any vocal channels, even within Aura's Discord or Twitter account, because Aura is a protocol run by Aura community members and contributors that, through governance voting, decide its future and development.
Q: What are the emissions that one vlAura vote provides?
A: For each one vlAura vote, there are two layers of emissions (BAL & AURA) directed toward the gauge in which the vote was cast. The calculations to retrieve the exact value of emission captured are defined by:
x = Amount of veBAL controlled by 1 vlAura = Total AuraBAL supply / Total vlAura supply
y = Amount of BAL emission controlled by 1 veBAL = BAL weekly emission / Total veBAL supply
p = Amount of BAL emissions controlled by 1 vlAura = x * y
a = Amount of newly emitted Aura controlled by 1 vlAura = (((500 - (totalAuraSupply() - 50000000) / 100000) * 2.5 + 700) / 500) * balEarned ) / Total vlAura supply
The balEarned value can be derived from this dune query: https://dune.com/queries/1242557/2130333
The total value of emissions controlled by 1 vlAura is = p * BAL price + a * AURA price
Q: How can I calculate the reward per veBAL or vlAura vote?
A: To calculate the emission per single veBAL vote, three variables are needed: the current BAL inflation rate, the price of BAL in $ terms, and the total amount of veBAL. The dollar emission per single vote will be
$ emission / vote = (121,920 * BAL price) / total veBAL, where:
For 2023, 121,920 is the current inflation rate of BAL per week . The emission schedule can be found here.
Total veBAL is calculated by looking into the amount of BAL/ETH BPT locked, taking into consideration also the amount of remaining duration of each user’s locking period.
The value of $ emission per veBAL can also be derived through this dune query.
The dollar emission per single vlAura vote is tied to the amount of veBAL controlled in the Aura protocol through AuraBAL. To calculate:
first, obtain how many AuraBAL are controlled per single vlAura
then, obtain the amount of BAL emissions controlled per vlAura
then, calculate how much Aura will be emitted every week
to get the $ value of Aura emissions per vlAura, calculate
lastly, sum the Aura $ emission value per vlAura to the Bal $ emission value per vlAura to reach the total value of incentives controlled per vlAura
The value of $ emission per vlAura can also be derived through this second dune query.
Overall, this Dune dashboard provides many insights on the value of emissions controlled per veBAL and vlAura.
On-chain information
Q: Is there an easy way to derive an Aura pool address given a Balancer LP address without knowing the Aura pool address?
A: You can often retrieve it manually by heading to the Etherscan holders’ page corresponding to the Balancer LP and looking for the Aura pool address within the first holders.
From a development perspective, it is necessary to check through the AURA API using the following query.
Q: How to find all contracts related to an Aura pool?
A: Go to the Info tab on the Aura pool page, and you’ll find the pool’s address list.
When clicking on the “Dev mode” toggle, extra information is provided:
Q: How to fetch the reward rate from the Aura pool contract?
A: Check rewardRate() in the Rewards contract corresponding to the pool, e.g., https://etherscan.io/address/0x1204f5060be8b716f5a62b4df4ce32acd01a69f5#readContract#F32
Q: How to retrieve the LP staked balance in the Aura pool contract?
A: Go to the Info tab on the pool page, and you’ll find the reward pool address. The balance comes from the rewardPool contract ( balanceOf on the contract).
Q: How can I get the total assets (total AuraBAL) I have staked in AuraBALRewards?
A: Total staked == balanceOf(). ERC4626 vaults always compound into the native asset, but this doesn't. No rewards are denominated in AuraBAL, so the balanceOf does not change.
The rewards for AuraBAL are in AURA, BAL, and bb-a-usd, which accrues to extraRewards and earned.
Q: Where can I get all of the reward tokens for a specific BPT staked in Aura?
A: Use “Rewards contract address” to show BAL rewards, use “extraRewards” on the rewards contract to show any extra rewards, and use “mint( ) “on the AURA contract for the logic of how much AURA is minted per BAL.
Arbitrum related questions
Q: What does it mean for Aura to expand on Arbitrum? A: Arbitrum is one of the most used L2s on the Ethereum network. Aura expanding on Arbitrum means we can further support optimised liquidity on Balancer pools deployed on this network, and let users accumulate incentives for this chain while having some perks like saving some gas.
Q: Can I lock Aura token on Arbitrum?
A: If you have Aura on the Arbitrum network, you need to bridge it to main net and then lock it there. There is also the possibility to contextually bridge and lock, by using the official tool available here.
Q: Can I delegate my vlAura to Hidden Hand and receive incentives from there?
A: As soon as early July, you will be able to delegate your vlAura to Hidden Hand on Arbitrum, and harvest rewards directly in that chain.
Q: Can I still participate in the voting on Snapshot for governance proposals? A: Yes! The snapshot website only requires a signature from the user’s wallet to express the preference on proposals.
Q: Can I mint, stake and unstake AuraBal on Arbitrum?
A: Yes! Just go to the page https://app.aura.finance/#/aurabal while connected to the Arbitrum network.
DAO questions
Q: Why are Discord messages deleted?
A: Aura has a general 1-month document retention policy that includes Discord server content.
Q: Who is the team behind Aura?
A: Aura has no team: it is a protocol that is run by contributors and community members that, through governance voting, decide its future and development.
Q: Who are the Aura Maxis?
A: The Aura Maxis are members of a “Service Provider” (SP) to the Aura Protocol initiated by AIP-28. Anyone can apply for to become an Aura Maxi here. After evaluating the proponent's skills, the current gap of the SP, and the goals pursued, the current Aura Maxi members will vote for eventual admission.
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