Fees & Rewards

Panther Protocol fees and rewards

TL;DR

• Fees can be categorized as:

  • Protocol fees

  • Network fees

• Rewards are issued as Panther Reward Points (PRPs)

• PRPs are exchanged for $ZKP as $zZKP

Introduction

Rewards are paid to the transactors for all activities that contribute to the Protocol's privacy set. With the exception of the withdrawal fee, Protocol fees are paid in $zZKP while the gas fee for the underlying chain is paid in that chain's native token. Fees are paid to service providers and Ecosystem Operators that contribute to the transaction lifecycle. A fee is paid on the withdrawal of assets from the Protocol, as this decreases the Protocol's privacy set.

Rewards

Users receive rewards whenever they conduct an activity beneficial to the Protocol’s privacy set. PRPs, Panther Reward Points, are issued for these in-app activities:

• Onboarding

Account creation is incentivized through an onboarding reward. This is key to building a network effect at launch.

• Deposit

Locking assets in the Panther Vault in exchange for zAssets.

• Send

Transferring zAssets to another Panther zAccount.

• Stake

Note, staking will be included in the mainnet beta app's function, at testnet, it's achieved through a separate app.

• Using DeFi adaptors.

• Topping up the $ZKP pool

The single-sided AMM pool must be recharged by a user willing to pay the gas fee and sign the transaction for transferring $ZKP from the Ethereum network to the base chain for the Protocol, i.e. Polygon for mainnet beta. This effort and cost is rewarded.

PRPs are exchanged for $ZKP as $zZKP.

Fees

Protocol fees are paid to Ecosystem Operators for their part in the transaction lifecycle, while the base chain's network fee, in this case Polygon's gas fee, is paid in their native token, i.e. on Polygon, in Matic. As per the following image showing the dApp deposit page.

Protocol fees

There are currently 4 Protocol fees:

• Relayer fee

• Processing fee

• Withdrawal fee

• KYC fee

As Panther releases the Protocol onto more chains, and enters its multi-chain phase, the cross-network gas fee will also apply.

Relayer fee

Relayers provide an optional service to Protocol users that adds to transactional privacy. Using the account abstraction model, Relayers sign transactions, pay the gas fees, and pass bundles of transactions to be executed in the Shielded Pool contract. This masks the origin of the account that created the transaction.

Processing fee

The processing fee pays the zMiner, an Ecosystem Operator that provides distributed computational power to support the Protocol transaction layer.

Withdrawal fee

Users are incentivized with rewards to remain in the Protocol, and disincentivized to remove assets with a withdrawal fee. As assets are removed from the Shielded Pool, the privacy set is decreased, and so a fee is applied in the token of transaction. This is a direct cost applied when users decide to move their assets out of the privacy-preserving environment of the Shielded Pool and back into their wallet address or other destination. As per the following image showing the dApp withdrawal page: note the fee level is still to be determined by the DAO, the value shown is a placeholder item only.

KYC fee

To create a zAccount, the user must comply with the KYC conditions stipulated by the manager of the Zone they are attempting to join. Typically, for most locales, this KYC process must be undertaken annually, and the fee is paid directly to the third-party service provider.

What next?

Next, let's dive deeper into how the fees that are paid to the Protocol on the withdrawal penalty circulate back into the Protocol's $ZKP economy.