MakerDAO founder says fully decentralized 'PureDai' will launch in few years

MakerDAO founder Rune Christensen said a future token, PureDai, will serve as a fully decentralized alternative to its U.S. dollar-pegged stablecoin.

Known as PureDai, the stablecoin will operate exclusively on the Ethereum mainnet and use ether and Lido staked ether (stETH) as collateral backing — fully relying on decentralized oracles. It will also have a free-floating peg, meaning the decentralized stablecoin may not be pegged to the dollar.

The launch of PureDai is aimed at users who prefer a vision of complete decentralization, according to Christensen. Dai DAI +0.075% holders will have the option to upgrade to PureDai once it becomes available, which is expected in a few years. 

"Dai users in the future will have the option of upgrading their Dai to PureDai, which is a return to the ideological roots of Dai," Christensen noted on X.

PureDai will complement a separate stablecoin, NewStable, which will also be released by MakerDAO in the near future. NewStable is considered a straightforward upgrade to Dai as it exists today and is designed to maintain Dai’s features while focusing on compliance with regulations concerning real-world asset support.

“To complement NewStable, a second, purely decentralized stablecoin, called PureDai, will also be made available as an option for users who prefer the vision of pure decentralization,” Christensen added.

MakerDAO launched Dai in 2017 as a stablecoin supported by decentralized collateral, such as ether and other cryptocurrencies.

The organization later shifted its strategy to include real-world assets like U.S. Treasuries. It introduced the ability for users to mint Dai via the USDC stablecoin using what’s known as the peg stability module. This led to Dai’s reliance on more centralized collateral options.

From Dai to PureDai

The MakerDAO founder is now exploring the possibility of another decentralized stablecoin with PureDai, although its launch is anticipated to be a few years away. Once it goes live, PureDai will not require any manual upgrades and will have no “permanent connection to Maker MKR -1.25% ,” Christensen added.

This comes as Dai’s supply has grown rapidly since the beginning of March, along with broader demand for stablecoins such as USDT and USDC. Its supply climbed from 4.4 billion on March 10 to now over 5.4 billion — a near-25% increase in just over two months. 

Dai is designed to maintain a value of $1.00. Users have the ability to generate Dai as a loan by depositing collateral into MakerDAO and issuing DAI proportionate to their collateral. Every Dai issued is supported by more than one dollar’s worth of assets, ensuring that each issued token is sufficiently backed. Currently, it’s the third-largest stablecoin by market cap.