Yahoo Autos ApeCoin Migration Draws Interest From Avalanche, Flow
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After Yuga Labs’ disastrous non-fungible token (NFT) minting for its “Otherside” metaverse land sale cost investors more than $100 million in transaction fees, board members of the Bored Ape Yacht Club-linked ApeCoin DAO are listening to offers about migrating ApeCoin (APE) off Ethereum, CoinDesk has learned.
Two suitors are Avalanche and Flow, according to executives at the firms behind both networks. Both blockchains consider themselves to be better suited for hosting a large-scale NFT ecosystem like the one Yuga is building.
Yuga Labs first alluded to a potential ApeCoin migration at the end of an April 30 Twitter thread, “encouraging” the decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) comprised of APE holders to consider it a possibility.
We're sorry for turning off the lights on Ethereum for a while. It seems abundantly clear that ApeCoin will need to migrate to its own chain in order to properly scale. We'd like to encourage the DAO to start thinking in this direction.
— Yuga Labs (@yugalabs) May 1, 2022
A source familiar with ApeCoin Foundation told CoinDesk the board had not previously considered migrating to a different layer 1, but that the tweet prompted discussion among the DAO’s members about a potential move, which remains ongoing.
While the DAO board is not “actively shopping” for new chains, according to the source, it recognizes its responsibility to implement the wishes of the DAO, including a chain migration if it were to be voted through in a proposal.
Members of the ApeCoin board include Reddit co-founder Alex Ohanian, Animoca Brands chairman Yat Siu and FTX’s head of gaming, Amy Wu.
The DAO has so far voted on 11 different proposals since its creation in March. Yuga Labs did not respond directly to CoinDesk’s request for comment on its influence over the decision-making process.
