Overview

To perform the following steps we will need the Network Beta dApp and Metamask. We will cover the following steps to delegate GRT.

Step 1: Setup your GRT delegation operations

Step 2: Delegate your GRT via the Network Beta dApp

Step 3: Manage your GRT staking operations

Before you get started, please make sure to have the latest version of the Metamask Browser Extension installed and to have enough ETH in your wallet to cover transaction fees. Furthermore, ensure that Metamask is connected to “Ethereum Mainnet”.

Using the Network Beta dApp with Metamask allows you to use a hardware wallet such as a Ledger Nano device for your delegation operations and is highly encouraged as it adds another layer of security. In case you want to use a hardware device for your delegation operations, connect Metamask to your device via the Metamask Browser Extension. Make sure to have the ETH app open on your Ledger device and to have ‘Contract Data’ allowed within the ETH app on your device.

                                         In case you want to use a Ledger device, connect it to Metamask before getting started

How to stake

1. Create/log in to your account

If you do not have an ERC-20 address yet, create one using the Metamask wallet.

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2. Setup your GRT delegation operations

To have Metamask display your GRT token, you need to add GRT to the list of displayed tokens. Open Metamask, Look for GRT in the Metamask search bar and directly add it without going through the custom token tab.

Alternatively,  switch to the Custom Token tab. Input the following information, click Next and then Add Tokens.

• Token Contract Address: 0xc944e90c64b2c07662a292be6244bdf05cda44a7
• Token Symbol: GRT
• Decimals of Precision: 18

How to add GRT to Metamask

In case you already own GRT with this address, you will now see your tokens displayed within Metamask. Otherwise, you need to fund this address properly before you can continue. Simply copy your address and withdraw/send funds to it. Once you successfully funded your account, you can find your token balance under Assets on Metamask.

Again, make sure to have enough ETH in your wallet to cover transaction fees.

Properly fund your account and make sure to have enough ETH to cover transaction fees

3. Delegate your GRT via the Network Beta dApp

Now it’s time to delegate! Head over to https://network.thegraph.com/. This is the Network Beta dApp and the Graph's main Staking UI.

Click Connect Wallet and Metamask in the pop-up. Now choose the address you want to be using in the Metamask Notification window, click Next, and then Connect.

How to connect Metamask to the Network Beta dApp

You will now find your account displayed in the upper right corner of the Network Beta dApp. You can click it to see your GRT balance as well as to disconnect or switch accounts.

You can find more information about your account in the upper right corner of the UI

If you scroll down in the Network Beta dApp, you can find a list of all the available Indexers as well as some parameters relevant for your staking operations.

You can find us as: chorusone.eth

Our full Indexer address: 0xe63e935fba572784d5aa40715e372e7948bbdb12

The Fee Cut % shows the percentage of query fee rebates that an Indexer keeps for him/herself, whereas the “Reward Cut %” indicates the percentage of indexer rewards that an indexer keeps for him/herself.

To start the delegation process, click on the delegation icon on the very right of the indexer that you would like to delegate to. Then click “Delegate”.

In the overlay menu that appears, you can choose the amount of GRT you want to delegate to the respective validator. Please note that delegating incurs a fee of 0.5% on the amount you are delegating.

Click Submit Transaction to continue. Then click Confirm in the Metamask Notification window to allow the dApp to spend your GRT. Afterward, click Confirm to transmit your delegation transaction.

Parameters Cooldown refers to the amount of time that needs to pass before an Indexer can change its’ query fee or its’ indexing reward cut.

In case you are using a Ledger, you need to approve and sign the transactions on your device as well.

This might take a while. Do not reload the page.

Finalize the delegation process by confirming the transactions

And that’s it, you are now a delegator on The Graph network and help to secure the query and indexing layer of web3! Welcome aboard and thank you for delegating to our Indexer.

Please note that the network is bootstrapped and subgraphs will transition from the hosted service to mainnet in the course of the next few weeks. Hence, the amount of query fees one can earn is limited at the moment.

Step 3: Manage your GRT delegation operations

You can manage your delegation operations via the Network Beta dApp.

Click on your address in the upper right corner of the Network Beta dApp to find an overview of the Indexers you are delegating to. Within this menu, you can choose to undelegate or delegate more GRT to the respective delegator. Alternatively, you can also do this within the Indexer overview that you find on the main page of the Network Beta dApp.

Please note that when you unbond your GRT, they remain locked and illiquid for a period of 28 days. There is no delegator slashing implemented in The Graph and you can choose to delegate any amount of GRT.

Happy New Year! Today, we are excited to announce the launch of our The Graph mainnet indexer node. Find us e.g. on the official dashboard (chorusone.eth). This post will focus on our journey so far and what you can expect when considering to delegate GRT tokens.

Why We Are Supporting The Graph

The Graph has become the industry standard for retrieving data from Ethereum applications, with prominent users including Coingecko, Uniswap, and many others.

We have experienced ourselves what it means to write custom code to retrieve blockchain data, to store it, and to service it for our staking platform Anthem. One of the reasons that makes us excited about The Graph is the potential to make extracting valuable information from any blockchain much easier, while at the same time not relying on a centralized party to maintain availability and to ensure integrity of the data.

The Graph is a core piece to enable truly trustless applications. By providing our infrastructure and expertise to the community, we hope to accelerate the growth of this ecosystem!

What You Need To Know About Delegating

The Graph is one of the most complex decentralized protocols with various, highly interconnected elements. The intricate economic design that features multiple roles (check out a primer here) is designed to optimally provide indexing and querying capabilities through a decentralized network of participants.

As a GRT holder, one option to participate in the system is by delegating to indexer nodes that are storing and servicing data. By delegating, GRT holders essentially increase the power of their chosen indexer operator in the protocol. Indexers need to allocate stake to subgraphs and are required to service queries from data consumers, the volume of which is determined by their relative stake allocated to a specific subgraph. To compensate delegators for putting up their capital to back indexing nodes, they receive a portion of the query and inflation rewards earned by the indexer. Indexers can determine their reward cut (the commission taken on newly minted GRT from the protocol) and their query cut (the commission taken on fees from queries served).

The rest of this post will focus on the inflation and reward cut dynamics, since these are expected to have the majority impact on the staking rewards received, especially in this early bootstrapping phase of the network.

If you are seeking to find out how much you will earn at the start, when queries fees are still low, these are the things you need to consider:

• Inflation and Staked Supply: 90% of the annual GRT issuance of 3%, so 2.7% are distributed to indexers and their delegators. Depending on how much of the total supply is staked, those staking will receive a higher APR per GRT staked. E.g. if 10% of the total GRT supply are delegated, the APR for staking GRT (disregarding commission and other factors that will be covered in the following) is 27% (2.7%/10%).
• Indexer Reward Cut: Every indexer can set a query and reward cut percentage. The reward cut is one factor that determines how the above mentioned inflation rewards are distributed between the indexer and its delegators. It describes the percentage of the total reward (both from the indexer itself and from outside delegations) that is kept by the indexer for offering its services.
• Indexer Stake-To-Delegation Ratio: Indexers need to stake GRT themselves and there is a limit to how much stake can be delegated to them before rewards don’t increase any longer. This is currently 16x of self-staked tokens. This self-stake portion can be slashed by 2.5% if the indexer provides incorrect data. Delegated balances cannot be slashed. Since in The Graph’s staking design all rewards (also the self-stake portion) are shared with delegators, the effective commission rate that delegators pay depends on both the ratio of indexer’s self-stake to delegated stake and the reward cut. As an example, if an indexer stakes 1 million GRT and has 6 million GRT delegated with a reward cut of 20%, its delegates actually pay an effective commission of 6.67%. Note that in cases with low Stake-To-Delegation Ratios the effective commission can actually turn negative meaning the indexer is essentially sharing more of his rewards with delegators than what he is earning in commissions. You can use this tool provided by The Graph Portal to estimate the effective commission rate. Future dashboards will likely incorporate this information and display effective commission rates or expected APRs on a per-indexer basis.
• Unbonding Period: When you want to stop staking, there is a 28 day delay until delegated GRT tokens become liquid again. This means that you need to carefully choose the indexer you delegate to, since if you want to switch you will need to wait out that unbonding period.

There’s also a one-time 0.5% fee when delegating GRT that is burned lowering the circulating GRT supply. At the time of writing there is around 9% of the GRT supply staking meaning the APR for staking GRT is 30% (before commission). Since our indexer does not have many delegations yet, our effective commission rate is actually negative meaning you’ll earn an even higher APR until delegations fill up!

How To Delegate

Fellow indexers and community members have already written delegation guides and built dashboards that are helpful if you want to put your GRT to work, here is a selection:

Official The Graph Dashboard: https://network.thegraph.com/
Staking Facilities Guide for Ledger + Metamask: https://stakingfac.medium.com/the-graph-staking-guide-5ec1455f4783
Graphlets Dashboard: https://graphlets.io/
The Graph Portal: https://thegraphportal.com/

Cover background image by Arash Ashgari on Unsplash.

Originally published at https://blog.chorus.one on January 1, 2021.