Dymension ($DYM)
Date of Research: Jan 2024, updated Nov 2024
Pronounced “dime,” DYM is not yet available for trading, although the portal suggests otherwise. Dymension is a modular blockchain, similar to Celestia, promoting its token with the tagline “DYM is money.” Technologically, the Dymension ecosystem is positioned as the “new internet,” where users interact with “RollApps”—applications built on the Dymension Hub—without needing to understand the underlying mechanics. Acting as the consensus layer for these applications, Dymension still depends on a data availability layer, such as Celestia or Ethereum, to complete its tripartite system.
Several red flags are present, outlined in the Conclusion section below, primarily regarding a lack of defined goals and an apparent inability—or reluctance—to address technical specifics. There has been very little adoption post-mainnet launch so it seems the tripartite model has been deemed unnecessary. Future prospects look dim.
Fundamental Analysis
Website
Creation date: 2022-03-21
Whitepaper
They don’t have a whitepaper, but do have docs.
Team
Number of founding team members: Maybe 3, but found through their GitHub contributor’s list. No other info is given.
Is the team doxxed? Mostly no, Yishay seems to be the only contributor named.
If no…
- have they provided a reason? Nope.
- What do we know them as?
- Yishay, Yishay doesn’t link to personal X on Github, only links to the Dymension X. His personal X is linked through a retweet of Barry’s – Yishay’s X (Joined May 2022, 2469 followers). On a X Space, Yishay suggested he is from Israel.
- OrJah (Joined April 2022, 1980 followers)
- Barry (Joined Nov 2010, 3913 followers)
- All have very few followers on GitHub (less than 15).
- They all basically only share things about DYM on their X accounts.
- Unclear if they’ve been involved in any other projects.
Funding
Possible seed round in 2023 for $6.7m. Builder Capital is an advisor, which is strange since they are a VC so it’s not clear why they aren’t a funder as well.
Goals & Purpose
What is the goal of the project?
To create a “new internet” where people can play games and gamble and create whatever they want with ease and without needing to know the specific technology/blockchain stack they are using.
What problem is the project trying to solve?
They don’t explicitly identify a problem in their docs. The sense they give in the docs and various interviews is that they think there needs to be an easier way for “RollApps” to deploy without needing to know how to code or set up their own ecosystem. Partially this is because they think app-chains will hit a wall regarding transaction throughput and so if they could rely on a base (L1) blockchain, they could more easily scale.
How do they plan to solve the problem?
“The Dymension Hub plays a similar role to a server in a traditional web application. It orchestrates the network by handling requests from RollApps and facilitating communication among them (p.s. it also has an AMM to trade your favorite RollApp token).”
- They claim the differences between Cosmos SDK and Dymension RDK as:
- RollApps use a time-based rather than height-based approach for state triggers, including minting tokens (apparently this was built by Osmosis and Stride but the DYM team “generalized it” by removing references to specific pools/incentives).
- Token distribution (unspecific)
- Sequencers get created accounts to receive rewards for operating the RollApp (again, unspecific).
- And Staking, which is also unclear, “Wrapper on the existing Cosmos SDK Staking module that prevents validator updates on the Proof-of-stake layer.”
- They also seem to think that their blockchain will have enough DPoS validators to maintain the network despite innumerable (currently in testnet over 12k) apps on top of it. Considering that as of Q4 2024 they have less than 200 validators, that seems unlikely unless they can scale massively.
Feasibility
Is this a new idea or has it been done before?
Considering they themselves say they are the “Cosmos SDK for RollApps”, it has been done before. In fact, Cosmos SDK can be implemented into the RollApp too. It seems the difference is that RollApps outsource the consensus problem to Dymension Hub, where if they solely run Cosmos SDK they still need to do their own consensus.
Have they actually created the infrastructure/code/whatever is necessary for this idea, or is it still just an idea?
Mainnet went live in Feb 2024.
Do you think other people would buy in?
Considering that as of 9 months after mainnet launch there are only two RollApps and the protocol is not seeing a lot of hype anymore, probably not.
Audit & Security
There are no known audits for this project, though their code may be on GitHub.
Sentimental Analysis
Social media: X, Discord, Telegram, Medium
Social media creation date: March 2022
Is it active? Y
Are people talking about the project off its own pages? Y
Is what they’re saying good or bad? Overall good, though some people were upset by the lack of clarity on the airdrop eligibility and issues with being blocked by location/VPNs
Are the people engaging with it paid to (promotors, influencers, sponsors etc)? Quite a few actually, yes. It seems like most of the top Youtube videos about it are probably paid. Though they don’t seem to have huge audiences so it’s kind of confusing.
- If yes, who is it and what is their audience like?
- Alt Crypto Gems (10.6k subs on Youtube). Very pumpy.
- Krypto Cove (12k subs on Youtube). Kind of how-to but mostly just hype.
- Stakecito (4.16k subs on Youtube). Their whole channel seems to just be airdrop coverage.
- CRYPTOacademy (467 subs on Youtube). They claim to be an education channel but have only really covered very obscure things. Not to mention, they are very hard to understand.
Where does this coin/token deserve to be on the list of top coins/tokens, if at all? DYM itself seems to have very little utility outside of its ecosystem, and it seems like the projects building on its ecosystem are going to be non-starters (a lot of the same type of things like gambling and gamefi, not a lot of uniqueness or utility), so it probably will not get in the top 20.
What’s happened on Google trends about the coin/token/project? There was interest in late 2023/early 2024 but since then it has crashed.
[image of Google Trends, with link]
Technical Analysis
Data: CoinGecko
Native network: Dymension, built with Cosmos SDK and works with Ethereum
Token usage (to pay fees or just an asset): Utility. RollApps need to bond it to create their RollApp. Security of Dymension Hub
Consensus mechanism: Delegated Proof of Stake
Can it be purchased in Centralized Exchanges?: Yes, some, with USDT pairs.
Active addresses:
- Cosmos ibc/9A76CDF0CBCEF37923F32518FA15E5DC92B9F56128292BC4D63C4AEA76CBB110
Tokenomics
Is this coin/token on its own blockchain or a different blockchain? Its own, native utility token.
When was the initial token distribution? Genesis Airdrop started at the beginning of Jan 2024 and users had 18 days to claim their tokens. Tokens were distributed after the claim period.
What was the form of the presale? N/A
Was there/will there be a lockup period? If yes, for how long? Yes, various depending on the group that received it (see below). Distribution Docs
Initial Coin Offering (ICO):
- Who received it? According to docs:
- Incentives Manager 33%
- Ecosystem and R&D 20%
- Core Contributing Team 20%
- Backers 14%
- Public allocation 8%
- Community Pool 5%
What was the initial price of the coin/token? $3.54
What was the initial liquidity of the coin/token? 1,000,000,000 DYM
Is there a limit to how many coins/tokens will be produced? Unclear. Perhaps the max was released upon launch.
Conclusion
Concerns:
- X Space interview from Jan 9 2024 had many red flags:
- An audience member asked what the average user experience would be and Yishay answered that they go to the portal.dymension.xyz and interact there. He said the portal is “an Amazon of rollapps”. That didn’t really answer the question –
- would the average person then go to the rollapp they are interested in and interact with it on its own site?
- And if a dev wants to create a rollapp, how would they go about it? This was answered in passing as a “one click solution”
- Note that Dymension RDK is supposed to provide an existing model for RollApps to use as a “one-click” – it has modules for on-chain governance, token issuance, etc.
- In early 2024, there were more than 10k rollapps on their testnet according to the above interview, which was reflected on the portal as well. The portal said there was over 9 million DYM TVL “bridged to rollapps” – but there is nowhere to purchase DYM, no value of DYM, and the explorer linked to from the site showed $0 (although the “Liquidity” tab on the portal led to an “Assets” list that showed DYM as $4.87 in Jan 2024 with a liquidity of $211M). Not sure where this was all being sourced as that was entirely on testnet. Now that the mainnet is live, there are only 2 rollapps launched with very low liquidity and trading volume.
- An audience member asked what the average user experience would be and Yishay answered that they go to the portal.dymension.xyz and interact there. He said the portal is “an Amazon of rollapps”. That didn’t really answer the question –
- Dymension, built with the Cosmos SDK, describes itself as a “layer 1 for layer 2s,” but its role is still fuzzy. Here’s the structure: RollApps use Dymension Hub to coordinate execution and then store most data on Celestia, with Dymension mainly acting as an aggregator. Since nearly all RollApps run on EVM and rely heavily on Celestia for data storage, this layered approach may be contributing to slow adoption.
- In Builder Capital’s video, Yishal says: “Everything about Dymension is designed to be very pragmatic. Just deposit, play, withdrawal. The tech is amazing, we can drill down, but I think a lot of people are too focused in crypto about the tech specs, etc., and not about the product side, the UX of what we’re trying to achieve here. I don’t think like proving why our system is technically superior makes any sense or value. What matters the most for me is that it’s usable.” This is clear in the lack of clarity of their docs, which does not lend credence to reliability or trustworthiness.
- Basically all the messaging from the team is “we can make money huzzah”. They’re strongly pushing gambling and games as RollApps because they believe that’s where the money is. Yishay even said on the 1/9/24 X spaces that the goal is to just “deposit into the gambling app and enjoy”.
- Clear favoritism. Only a select few NFTs were airdropped – not sure why.
- When asked to explain Dymension like they’re 5, Yishal replied (in the 1/9/24 X space): “If you want your own blockchain, come to Dymension and we’ll sell you it.”