The Curve Finance decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) is currently voting on a groundbreaking proposal that would establish a $60 million credit line in crvUSD for a new protocol called Yield Basis. Introduced in August by founder Michael Egorov, the proposal has garnered overwhelming support with 97% of votes cast in favor as voting began on Wednesday, September 18, 2025.
Under the Yield Basis system, CRV holders who stake their tokens would receive veCRV (vote-escrowed CRV) in return, creating sustainable income streams for stakers. The protocol would distribute between 35% and 65% of its value to veCRV holders, while reserving an additional 25% for the broader Curve ecosystem. Egorov stated the credit line would be sufficient to create liquidity pools for three Bitcoin-related assets: WBTC, cbBTC, and tBTC.
The proposal represents a significant shift from one-off incentives to sustainable income generation, addressing Curve's recent challenges including a drop in total value locked (TVL) from $24.2 billion in January 2022 to $2.4 billion currently, multiple DNS attacks, and founder Michael Egorov's liquidation events that resulted in $10 million in bad debt and over $140 million in losses in 2024.
Egorov explained that Yield Basis tackles the problem of impermanent loss by borrowing and creating a supply sink simultaneously, allowing TVL and debt to scale without negatively affecting crvUSD's peg. The voting period runs until September 24, 2025, with the proposal seen as a major step to strengthen CRV tokenomics amid broader DeFi sector growth that has seen total TVL across all protocols rise 40.9% to $163.2 billion since January 2025.