One of the big news in the crypto sphere last week was Arbitrum's announcement of its government token ($ARB) airdrop date (Thursday, March 23) and transition to the DAO government model:

First things first, Arbitrum is a prominent layer 2 scaling solution for Ethereum designed to address the network's limitations by utilising an off-chain mechanism. This allows it to increase the volume of processed transactions and reduce fees, thus improving the user experience. Arbitrum accomplishes this by enabling users to conduct transactions on a sidechain, which is then validated and reconciled with the Ethereum mainnet. To learn more about the benefits of Arbitrum and how it works, refer to this short explainer.

Among other competing L2 solutions, like Optimism (OP), Arbitrum has been one of the eye-catching revelations of the crypto ecosystem despite the turbulence that hit the market in 2022.

And as per Total Value Locked (TVL), Arbitrum seems to be in a good position to win that race, being fourth on the list, according to DeFi Llama, – right behind Ethereum, Tron, and the Binance Smart Chain:

Some other bullish arguments on Arbitrum you may find here, for example, while we will get back to our main topic.

Arbitrum will distribute its governance token ($ARB) to its community members on March 23.

This should bring the protocol one step closer to being fully decentralised because of the transition to the new DAO government model. Here's what one might expect in short or in great detail from Messari.

Speaking of airdrop itself, eligibility is determined by a number of factors, including bridging to either Arbitrum One or Arbitrum Nova, transacting on the network for several months, interacting with multiple smart contracts, conducting transactions exceeding $10,000 in value, and providing liquidity of over $10,000 to various protocols. Completing any of these steps guarantees users a portion of the ARB airdrop, and the allocation size increases as more criteria are fulfilled.

According to Arbitrum, the genesis airdrop snapshot was captured on February 6, and no additional snapshots will be taken. If you have interacted with the Arbitrum network on or before that date, you are likely eligible for the airdrop. Otherwise, there is no reason to take any measures. Complete distribution specifications you'll find in the official docs. Although users can simply check whether they qualified on the project's website.

Arbitrum will airdrop 11.62% of the overall token supply. The remaining tokens will be distributed as follows:

  • 42.78% to the Arbitrum DAO treasury
  • 26.94% to the team and its advisors
  • 17.53% to investors
  • 1.13% to DAOs operating within the Arbitrum ecosystem

Unlike ETH, which is used to pay fees on Ethereum and Arbitrum, the ARB token will only be used for protocol governance.

While Crypto Twitter discusses the possible listing price of the ARB, several major crypto exchanges have already announced the token's listing.

But as a warning against reckless market speculation, a quote from a popular pseudonymous altcoin trader: