Тег: tokenomics

Libertarianism and Social Experiments

In a recent Montelibero news post, I mentioned that among the project participants, there are surprisingly few—not to mention active members—of either of the two Libertarian parties of Russia, or even people somehow connected to them. Perhaps this thought is worth expanding upon.

Of course, at the start of the project, no one could say exactly what it would turn into over time. One founder saw it as a center for agorism. Another as a platform for the future transformation of Montenegro along libertarian lines. For me, it was a platform for the evacuation of Russian political activists from the Putin regime. As a result, we do indeed have a center for agorism, and the strategic goal of transforming Montenegro is written in our project description, although we haven’t made much progress in that direction. As for the evacuation platform—we indeed became one, but more and more people joining us are not political activists, but ordinary libertarians who aren’t interested in any such politics.

And, you know, it seems that this is actually a good thing. Judging by what reached me during the period when I was still relatively close with political libertarians, the bulk of their party activity boiled down to bickering over the charter and dividing power within the party (which happened to be splitting in two at the time). Here, frictions occasionally arise regarding the coordination of joint activities, but there is none of this endless expelling of people from the movement. You approve of the market, you don’t approve of state intervention, you don’t practice coercion—well, great, we are on the same path, and you can get acquainted with the smart books in your spare time, if you get around to it.

I was recently asked what, exactly, distinguishes our community from any other hangout, since here in Montenegro, there are several other emigrant groups that likewise do not practice violence and fully approve of freedom. I had to think about it, and as a result of my reflections, I found the only fundamental difference: we have tokenomics. That is, essentially, we simply actively practice the formalization of our market relations and obligations in an explicit form, and it is precisely this that gives us the opportunity to develop very actively.

The question arises: what if some other community manages to implement tokenomics for themselves, how will they differ from us? And here I note with surprise that, in essence, they won’t. Tokenomics (unlike cryptocurrencies) operates on trust, because linking tokens to real-world objects is impossible without trust. And trust among community members is possible only because they share a common value, such as a love for the market—specifically, for voluntary transactions. Any inclinations toward ideas that it’s useful to deceive “suckers” will be immediately rejected by the community (along with the carriers of such ideas), because our mutual obligations are not secured by any state violence, and deploying the tools of private violence is expensive and troublesome, and just not worth it. If some other community manages to reproduce similar relations within itself, we can boldly recognize them as our equals, and at the same time recognize their tokens. Thus, a completely seemingly auxiliary tool unnoticedly turns out to be a unique feature and almost the basis of identity.

As for political methods of solving problems, it’s truly better to leave them to the parties. And for them, we are apparently doomed to remain a completely non-political project, whether for selling land or some other politically meaningless activity. Let’s wish these guys luck in their mission, but if any party member wants to move from politics to economics—our doors are open.

Do you accept EURMTL?

Montelibero Tokenomics. Part 1, theoretical.

Everything related to “crypto” is a hype topic, and moreover, a source of endless disputes between adherents of different development paths for the fashionable crypto industry. I would like to bring a bit more clarity to how this is organized here in Montelibero, so that you can make informed decisions about whether it is worth investing in us, and if so, exactly what to invest in.

What is tokenomics? It is the economics of tokens, that is, the structure of the market in which they circulate, the rules, traditions, and (importantly) the purpose of their circulation.

What are tokens? Applied to our situation, these are information objects that circulate instead of the real objects that the tokens symbolize. A company share is a token of ownership in a company. A futures contract for a barrel of oil is a token for the obligation to deliver a barrel of oil. The British pound was a token for a pound of silver. More accurately, it used to be, but then it scammed, and now it continues to circulate without its previous commodity backing.

Tokens are not cryptocurrencies. We will not even try to define what cryptocurrencies are here, because people tend to understand this as too broad a class of objects. Therefore, we simply state that there are some cryptocurrencies on the basis of which it is convenient to issue one’s own tokens. For the tokenomics of Montelibero, the Stellar blockchain was initially chosen, in which its own cryptocurrency called Lumen circulates. There were exclusively technical reasons for this:

  • transactions are very cheap
  • the transaction language is quite advanced
  • there is a decent set of tools for managing tokenomics based on Stellar
  • among the participants of the Montelibero project, there are people who understand these tools

Why did we decide to create tokenomics around Montelibero? In principle, there are precedents for the creation of collective projects where there is simply an initiative group that does the work, volunteers can join them, and donations can be made to them. You can also buy the product of their activity or futures for it.

But this is all a rather opaque story. If you buy from us a promise for a piece of land, and the record of this is stored somewhere in the history of our correspondence or on our website, you will reasonably fear that tomorrow this record may disappear, and you will have no way to prove it was there. If the tokens of all our public promises lie on a blockchain that we do not control, we cannot pretend they do not exist, although nothing still prevents us from reneging on the promises, despite the undeniable fact of their existence. Unfortunately, not even insurance companies provide a hundred percent guarantee, and here you (and we) will have to rely primarily on the institution of reputation.

The goal of the Montelibero project is the wide implementation of libertarian practices in Montenegro. For this, we need many successful libertarians to appear in Montenegro, acting in accordance with their principles. To achieve this, we need to ensure this very success for the libertarians relocating to Montenegro.

Therefore, the key token in the tokenomics of Montelibero is the token of the eponymous investment fund, called MTL. The funds raised from the issuance of these tokens are invested by us in the development of the infrastructure necessary for the settlers, invested in their business, as well as invested in the business of libertarians outside Montenegro, if we expect to receive income from this. Or we simply save it for future targeted investments. Buyers of MTL tokens, accordingly, receive the right to regular dividends, the size of which is not fixed and is determined solely by the profit received from the fund’s investments.

In what are the dividends paid? Allow me to introduce the second key token of the system – the stablecoin EURMTL… Stop. Now I need to speak in more detail about stablecoins.

Stablecoins are private money with stable purchasing power, usually pegged to certain state currencies. Why money should be private, and how the stability of the exchange rate will be ensured, can be read briefly in Friedman’s Free to Choose in the chapter The Market for Money. Many stablecoins circulate in the world, but mostly they are pegged to the dollar, while the euro is used in Montenegro. Therefore, we made our own and issued it on the same blockchain as all our other tokens. Now it is the main unit of account for our entire tokenomics, for which any asset traded within the project can be acquired. But not only that.

Furthermore, EURMTL can be exchanged 1:1 for cash euros with any of our guarantors in Montenegro. Therefore, those of us who have already relocated to Montenegro use EURMTL among ourselves as cashless euros, for example, in situations where it is necessary to split a check in a coffee shop. This is much more convenient than transfers between bank accounts. We hope that over time the network of users of our stablecoin will expand enough to begin significantly influencing the economy of Montenegro, and this competition will spur local clumsy banks to improve the quality of their services.

And if you do not live in Montenegro yet, but participate in our tokenomics, we also guarantee you the possibility to exchange EURMTL for Lumens at the current exchange rate of the euro (for this, we keep open orders to buy EURMTL for Lumens on the Stellar exchange built into the system, automatically recalculating the rate according to the fluctuations of the euro price). Then, with the Lumens received, you can go to any exchange you trust and change them into state money of your choice (including the money of the state of El Salvador, i.e., Bitcoins).

What does the fund primarily invest in? Since we are preparing infrastructure for settlers, the fund has acquired a hectare of land and is now improving it. This hectare was also tokenized, so the third important token in our tokenomics is MTLCITY. Some of these tokens were bought by settlers or those planning to move to Montenegro in the near future. In accordance with their share in the total mass of MTLCITY tokens, their owners will receive ownership of their land plots when the land is prepared for privatization. This token is no longer traded on the primary market and is only used for accounting as to who is entitled to what area of land. Immediately before privatization, we will conduct a final offsetting, when those whose number of tokens is excessive for the real plot they claim will sell them at par to those whose number of tokens is insufficient.

Another important direction of the fund’s investments is the GPA tokens – the business of one of our first settlers, specializing in offline trade directly in Montenegro, as well as the MTLBR tokens – a construction company that is currently engaged in the improvement of the land acquired by the fund, but plans to enter a wider market over time.

I will not list all the tokens in the Montelibero system in this article – at the very least, I don’t know them all. Generally speaking, anyone can issue their own token; the other matter is to ensure its circulation. For example, I also have a token ANCAPCHAN, but, as you can see, its liquidity cannot be called outstanding. With its help, I merely recorded my debt to the fund, which spent money on my naturalization in Montenegro, and then after some time repaid it.

In the next article, I intend to give practical instructions for those who decide to dive into all this machinery, and I want to dedicate the third article to the latest promising developments at the intersection of tokenomics and cryptocurrencies, which I will not even pretend to fully understand myself.