Red Beard Ventures
937 posts
@RedBeardVC
Democratizing VC | Investors in @superrare @dapperlabs @genies @poapxyz @zed_run @robotireinc & more | Led by @drewaustin
INTRODUCING AMPLE A new way to compound onchain assets. Deposit supported assets, retain full principal ownership, and earn variable upside.
Today we released the beta for Ample, a new savings protocol we built at Layer3. Ample is inspired by the UK’s Premium Bond system and rebuilt using onchain financial infrastructure. Users deposit supported assets, retain full ownership of principal, and the yield generated across all deposits is pooled to fund recurring, randomized payouts. In each period, a small number of participants receive outsized outcomes, funded by the same underlying yield that would otherwise be distributed evenly. As I’ve written about before, there are several structural reasons why I believe this product is well timed. For most of the post-2008 period, savings products built around pooled yield faced a core limitation of insufficient and unstable yield. In low-rate environments, it was difficult to fund meaningful upside without introducing leverage, principal risk, or opaque balance sheet mechanics. Today, onchain money markets now provide consistent, programmatic yield that can sustainably support payout mechanisms at scale. Distribution has also changed. Historically, premium bond-style savings products were constrained by local deposit bases and national banking systems. Today, stablecoins and USD balances held in fintech wallets function as a global, dollar-denominated liability layer. This allows a protocol like Ample to aggregate deposits and yield across partners and geographies, enabling payout pools and expected outcomes that no single institution could realistically offer on its own. Transparency was another historical limitation. Prior attempts relied on opaque payout logic that was difficult for users, and often regulators, to verify. With smart contracts and verifiable randomness, payout rules can now be codified onchain. Users can see exactly how yield is accrued, how payouts are calculated, and how the payout budget is allocated. The system is auditable by design. The underlying infrastructure has matured as well. The onchain stack today looks materially different than it did in previous cycles. Smart wallets abstract away key management and gas complexity. Layer 2 networks have reduced settlement costs. On and off ramps have expanded to the point where users can move between local currency and stablecoins with minimal friction. Taken together, this creates a UX environment where an onchain savings product can operate with the same, or better, usability as a traditional fintech application. From a user behavior perspective, the appeal of this type of savings structure is well established. Humans consistently prefer variable outcomes over fixed yield, even when the expected return is identical. This preference has driven adoption of regulated savings products globally, including in the United States and the United Kingdom, where Premium Bonds alone represent approximately $150 billion in deposits. The mechanism works because it changes how yield is experienced, not how it is generated. From an integrator perspective, this savings model offers a way to increase asset retention without increasing risk. Assets remain deposited longer because the experience is more engaging than static APY. Ample turns this structure into a reusable primitive. If successful, wallets, exchanges, and fintechs should be able to offer this savings model for idle assets such as USDC, BTC, ETH, SOL, and tokenized equities. Over time, a meaningful share of onchain yield could route through pooled savings structures rather than traditional yield products. The beta release is focused on validating a small number of variables: initial asset selection, user behavior and retention, payout cadence, partner integration surfaces, and jurisdictional posture. Ample takes a small fee on yield before payouts are distributed. Ample is built entirely within Layer3, and any protocol revenue generated flows directly to the L3 treasury. The beta is intentionally limited in scope. The objective is to test whether the structural assumptions outlined above translate into real usage and durable behavior. If they do, Ample becomes less of a consumer-facing application and more a financial primitive that others embed. Follow along @AmpleHQ
