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Ava's State of the DAO 2025
Last Updated: 2025-03-20
Welcome to our 3rd State of the DAO report.
This is a special mid-year edition to formally communicate to our community that Ava's DAO has entered Maintenance Mode while we undertake a comprehensive overhaul of our core infrastructure.
🔧
Maintenance Mode
Ava's DAO is currently in Maintenance Mode.
All public-facing products remain operational, but no new features are being shipped.
Our full engineering capacity is dedicated to infrastructure upgrades.
There is currently no ETA for returning to Production Mode.
Progress updates will be posted in Discord and on this page as milestones are reached.
What Does "Maintenance Mode" Mean?
Maintenance Mode is a deliberate operational state in which the DAO pauses all new feature development to focus exclusively on strengthening, upgrading, and future-proofing the technical foundation that every product depends on.
✅ What IS happening
- Critical bug fixes and security patches
- Infrastructure migration and re-architecture
- NexScript v2 smart contract rewrites
- Database and indexer performance overhaul
- CI/CD pipeline modernization
- Dependency audits and upgrades across all repos
- Internal documentation and runbook creation
⏸ What is NOT happening
- New feature releases for WiserSwap, Minado, or Causes Cash
- New token launches or airdrop campaigns
- New third-party integrations or partnerships
- Marketing campaigns or public events
- Onboarding of new core contributors
Why Now?
After two years of rapid product shipping (6 products in 2023, 3 major launches in 2024), our infrastructure accumulated significant technical debt.
The Nexa protocol upgrade that activated on March 15, 2025 introduced fundamental changes to the VM scripting engine — read-only UTXOs, script machine registers, and increased script limits — that require a ground-up rewrite of our smart contract suite.
Rather than patch contracts incrementally while shipping new features (and risk introducing vulnerabilities), we made the decision to pause, rebuild properly, and return to production with a dramatically more capable and secure stack.
The honest truth:
We could keep shipping. But we've watched other projects do that — duct-taping new features onto aging foundations until something breaks catastrophically.
Our community trusts us to be better than that.
Maintenance Mode is how we honor that trust.
Infrastructure Upgrade Scope
The following table outlines each workstream, its current status, and what it unblocks once complete.
| Workstream |
Description |
Status |
Unblocks |
| NexScript v2 Contract Suite |
Full rewrite of all DAO smart contracts to leverage read-only UTXOs and script registers introduced in the March 2025 protocol upgrade |
In Progress |
WiserSwap v2, Minado v2, all future products |
| Custom Indexer (Rostrum Replacement) |
Purpose-built UTXO indexer targeting 10,000+ req/sec, replacing Rostrum's ~1,200 req/sec ceiling |
In Progress |
All on-chain queries, explorer, wallet backends |
| NEXA.js v3 SDK |
Major version bump: tree-shakeable ESM build, native TypeScript, NexScript v2 helpers, and WebSocket-first architecture |
Planning |
All frontend/backend apps, third-party devs |
| CI/CD & DevOps Overhaul |
Migration to containerized deployments, automated testing pipelines, staging environment parity, and reproducible builds |
Complete |
Faster, safer deployments for all products |
| Dependency Audit |
Full audit of all npm, Rust, and Python dependencies across every DAO repo; pin versions, remove unused packages, patch CVEs |
Complete |
Reduced attack surface, smaller bundles |
| Database Migration |
Transition from single-node PostgreSQL to a replicated cluster with read replicas; schema normalization for multi-product support |
In Progress |
WiserSwap analytics, Minado feeds, API latency |
| Internal Documentation & Runbooks |
Comprehensive ops runbooks, architecture decision records (ADRs), and onboarding guides for future contributors |
In Progress |
Faster onboarding, institutional knowledge preservation |
| $NXL + $STUDIO Token Migration |
Snapshot-based migration of legacy token contracts to NexScript v2 addresses with holder verification |
Planning |
Brand consolidation, WiserSwap v2 trading pairs |
Product Status Dashboard
All existing products remain online and functional. No services have been taken offline as part of Maintenance Mode.
Below is the current operational status of each product.
| Product |
Status |
Notes |
| WiserSwap |
Operational |
v1 live; swaps and LP functions working. No new pair listings until v2. |
| Minado |
Operational |
Mining and content feeds active. No new engagement features until v2. |
| Causes Cash |
Operational |
Campaigns can be created and funded. Rainmaker and Launchpad functional. |
| NEXA.js SDK |
Operational |
v2 stable on npm. Critical patches only until v3 begins. |
| AVAS Staking |
Operational |
Daily, monthly, and yearly reward distributions continue as scheduled. |
| CashFusion (Privacy) |
Operational |
Fusion rounds running. Coordinator uptime: 99.8% YTD. |
Treasury Overview (YTD through March 20, 2025)
With the DAO in Maintenance Mode, expenditures have been significantly lower than in previous years.
Inflows continue from WiserSwap trading fees and staking reward recapture.
| Asset |
Opening Balance (Jan 1) |
Inflows (YTD) |
Outflows (YTD) |
Current Balance |
| NEXA |
50,750,000 |
+6,420,000 |
-4,180,000 |
52,990,000 |
| AVAS |
354,250,000 |
+0 |
-8,100,000 |
346,150,000 |
| NXL |
85,500,000 |
+0 |
-1,200,000 |
84,300,000 |
YTD Expenditure Breakdown
| Category |
NEXA Spent |
% of Total |
| Infrastructure & Hosting |
1,850,000 |
44.3% |
| Core Development (contract rewrites) |
1,600,000 |
38.3% |
| Security Audits & Patches |
480,000 |
11.5% |
| Operational / Misc |
250,000 |
6.0% |
| Total YTD |
4,180,000 |
100% |
Maintenance Mode has reduced the DAO's monthly burn rate by approximately 68% compared to the 2024 average.
At the current burn rate, the NEXA treasury alone provides over 30 months of runway — before accounting for ongoing fee revenue.
Community & Governance
Governance remains active during Maintenance Mode. The decision to enter Maintenance Mode was itself ratified via on-chain proposal (Proposal #23, passed with 91.2% approval on January 8, 2025).
4
Proposals Submitted (YTD)
3 passed · 1 under discussion
87%
Avg. Voter Participation
Highest annual rate to date
1,580
Discord Members
Up from 1,340 at year-end 2024
Notable Proposals
| # |
Title |
Result |
Approval |
| 23 |
Enter Maintenance Mode — pause feature development, redirect resources to infra |
Passed |
91.2% |
| 24 |
Allocate 1.6M NEXA for NexScript v2 contract audit retainer |
Passed |
88.7% |
| 25 |
Extend AVAS staking reward epoch duration from 30 to 45 days during Maintenance Mode |
Passed |
79.4% |
| 26 |
Community request: publish monthly infra progress updates in Discord |
Voting |
— |
Year-over-Year Comparison
| Metric |
2023 |
2024 |
2025 (YTD) |
| Products Shipped |
6 |
3 |
0 (Maintenance Mode) |
| AVAS Holders |
1,247 |
2,860 |
3,140 |
| NEXA Treasury |
38.4M |
50.8M |
53.0M |
| Monthly Burn Rate (avg) |
2.03M |
5.16M |
1.53M |
| Voter Participation |
78% |
84% |
87% |
| Discord Members |
489 |
1,340 |
1,580 |
| Core Contributors |
12 |
16 |
16 |
Deprecation Update
The platform deprecations announced in the 2024 report are proceeding as planned.
Maintenance Mode has not affected the deprecation timeline.
| Platform |
Successor |
Status |
| NEXA.exchange |
WiserSwap |
Sunset Complete |
| NexaSwap.com |
WiserSwap |
Redirect Live |
| NEXA.garden |
Causes Cash |
Migration In Progress |
| NEXA.sh |
Internal tooling |
Migration In Progress |
| NEXA.studio |
Minado dev tools |
Planning |
Frequently Asked Questions
When will Maintenance Mode end?
There is currently no ETA. We will not rush back to Production Mode until the infrastructure upgrades meet our quality and security standards. Progress updates will be shared regularly in Discord and on this page.
Are my staked AVAS tokens safe?
Yes. All staking contracts are on-chain and non-custodial. Maintenance Mode does not affect the security or accessibility of staked assets. Reward distributions continue as scheduled (now on 45-day epochs per Proposal #25).
Can I still use WiserSwap and Minado?
Yes. All products remain fully operational. You can swap tokens, provide liquidity, mine NXY, and create campaigns on Causes Cash. No features have been disabled.
Will there be new token listings on WiserSwap during Maintenance Mode?
No. New trading pair listings are paused until WiserSwap v2 launches on the upgraded NexScript v2 contracts.
What about the $NXL and $STUDIO token migrations?
These migrations are in the planning phase and depend on the NexScript v2 contract suite being completed. Holder snapshots will be announced well in advance. No action is required from holders at this time.
How can I stay updated?
Join our Discord for real-time updates. Governance proposals are publicly visible on-chain. Major milestones will also be posted on this transparency page.
Closing Remarks
Maintenance Mode is not a retreat — it's an investment. Every day we spend strengthening the foundation is a day that pays compound returns when we resume building.
We know silence can be uncomfortable. In a space that rewards constant announcements and artificial hype, choosing to go quiet and focus on real work is a statement in itself. We would rather ship nothing for months and come back with infrastructure that lasts for years, than push out half-baked updates to appear busy.
To our community: thank you for your patience, your continued governance participation, and your trust.
The DAO is healthy. The treasury is strong. The team is heads-down building.
Don't trust. Verify. And when it's time to build — build it right.
This report was prepared by the Ava's DAO core team and published on March 20, 2025.
All financial figures are denominated in native token units and are verifiable on-chain.
This is a living document — it will be updated as infrastructure milestones are reached.
For questions or corrections, reach out in our Discord or open an issue on GitHub.