Roundtable of Dogs Meeting #20 Notes — December 4th, 2025
(Includes Interim Roundtable recap — December 10th, 2025)
RToD #21 will take place 1/21/2026 and summary will be posted 1 day after the meeting.
Everything included below has already taken place and is a historical recap of the discussions and actions taken by K9 DAO including the recent Snapshot vote.
Attendees:
Turtle
Buzz
Couch
Shane
Queen
Mudd
Sentinel
Hero
Dream
Danger
Listened to recording and voted but did not attend:
Archangel
Did not attend or vote
Seth
Meeting Intro
Roundtable opened with a status review of the Shibarium bridge exploit, the expired K9 + Shib bounty window, and what K9 DAO needs to decide next given limited communication from Shib IO.
Shibarium Bridge Exploit Status
Discussion reaffirmed that the Shibarium bridge remains functional only for BONE, while other major ecosystem assets were sold and laundered by the attacker.
- Bridge functionality remains limited to BONE-only bridging.
- Attacker activity: most significant ecosystem tokens were sold and routed through TornadoCash.
- LEASH remains held by the attacker, potentially linked to the same actor involved in the historical LEASH rebase exploit.
- Shib announced a compensation plan, but no concrete execution steps have been observed.
- Shib IO has been largely non-communicative for ~2 weeks leading into the meeting.
K9 + Shib Bounty to Attacker
The Roundtable reviewed the outcome of the joint bounty effort and what that implies for next steps.
- The 25 ETH bounty ended November 27th at ~5:00 AM EST and was not accepted by the attacker.
- Following the bounty expiration (and Shima’s disclosure work), Shib IO has not responded to follow-up messages.
- Primary next step identified: determine whether any compensation plan is realistically forthcoming, and if not, what actions the DAO proceeds with and on what timeline.
Tracing the Attacker
Tracing progress and the current status of external follow-through were reviewed.
- As discussed in the prior Roundtable, the MetaSleuth trace was shared with KuCoin and Shib IO; no action has been observed from either party.
- On December 1st, Shima published the full trace publicly for transparency and broader visibility:
https://x.com/MRShimamoto/status/1995582570650902587
Reducing Infrastructure Expenses and Operational Overhead
With the Google Grant shifting from 100% coverage to 20% in February 2026, the dev team outlined expense-reduction items targeted to complete before the grant change.
Still in exploration / planned before Feb 2026:
- Adjust knBONE bridge uptime to run a few times daily instead of 24/7.
- Shut down K9’s Sentry and use an alternate network sentry to reduce overhead while maintaining validator IP protection.
- Shut down K9 Testnet and archive nodes.
- Shut down K9 Quest infrastructure (airdrop calculations complete; infrastructure no longer needed).
- Evaluate shutting down minor CEX listings that represent mostly sell pressure and low/inorganic activity (discussed: BingX, WEEX, LBank, CoinW), while maintaining more justifiable venues based on historical activity (Gate, MEXC, BitMart).
Completed actions noted:
- BigQuery/Dune ingest processes (~$800–$900/mo) — DONE
- Shutting down inactive International Telegram groups to reduce daily spam/moderation overhead — DONE
Airdrop App & K9 Quest
Product status updates were shared alongside what’s gating next steps.
- Airdrop App: Alpha testing has gone well. Development on hold until further progress made on Shibarium Bridge hack resolution.
- Internal testing/QA planned through the following week with contributors including: Couch, Shima, Ippo, Turtle, Buzz, Shane, and others.
- A more precise go-live timeline to be shared in RT chat based on QA outcomes.
- K9 Quest: Confirmed complete; airdrop distribution remains on hold pending decisions on how the DAO will move forward post-hack.
Market Making & Liquidity Operations
Ongoing optimization work continues with market making partners.
- Focus remains on maintaining an efficient orderbook between CEX and DEX.
- Strategy includes keeping key venues healthy while evaluating the long-tail exchanges that may be net-negative.
Treasury & Macro Market Overview
Treasury positioning was reviewed alongside ETH price movement and response planning.
- Treasury reduced due to ETH moving from ~$3.5k to ~$3.2k.
- Team monitoring ETH recovery signals (including macro news around QT potentially coming to an end).
- Contingency: prepared to rotate ETH into USDC if market strength fails to sustain.
Marketing Sub-DAO Updates
Shane provided a short operational/strategy update, with a note that recent activity included elevated spend due to event-related costs (Futurist).
How to Move Forward
Buzz walked through options 1–5 as current paths forward derived from legal feedback, with the goal of determining how the DAO will select a direction (vote format and timing).
- Decision focus: clarify which options remain valid, how they are framed for token holders, and when/how the DAO will run a formal vote.
Budget Update
- No new budget proposal was introduced; existing budget continues by default.
- Approved Budget: $60k / month
- Development & Ops: $25k
- Marketing Sub-DAO: $15k
- Software & Infrastructure Backlog: $34k (catch-up / stabilization items)
- Actual monthly spend (baseline ops): ~$40k
- Total including catch-up payments: ~$74k (not expected to recur at that level)
- Yield on treasury positions: ~$1.4k / month
- Marketing Sub-DAO wallet balance updated to ~$40k after the $15k top-up; higher-than-usual spend noted due to Futurist.
Proposals Reviewed / Voted On (Roundtable #20)
NO PROPOSALS TO REVIEW
Interim Roundtable Meeting Notes — December 10th, 2025
This interim session was held to reset alignment on the post-hack reality, clarify DAO responsibilities, and separate “clarification” from “future direction” so the Roundtable can guide next steps without rushing outcomes.
Clarifying the Current State & Responsibilities of the DAO
Key themes covered:
- Purpose: Establish a shared understanding of what happened, where things stand, and how the hack changed K9’s operating environment.
- DAO responsibility: K9 can implement and advise, but direction must ultimately be proposed, debated, and owned by the DAO — participation is required for governance to function.
- Litepaper commitments: Core commitment was delivering liquid staking — the product was built, deployed, and operated as intended. Current constraints are tied to external Shibarium ecosystem failure, not lack of delivery.
- Scope impact: The hack introduced dependencies and risk constraints that prevent continued operations in the prior form and influence feasible timelines and resource needs.
- Treasury stewardship: K9 retaining a meaningful treasury was framed as a rare strength vs. peer projects — enabled by disciplined spending and supplemental grant support — creating optionality.
Options Review & Vote-Path Planning
The group revisited forward-path options and discussed how they should be surfaced for broader community voting.
- Options reviewed ranged from rebuilding/pivoting to conservative/wind-down approaches.
- Additional discussion emphasized Option 6 as a potentially viable path that could aim to make users whole while minimizing treasury drain versus fully compensating from treasury-held tokens.
Discussion: BASE vs BNB (Option 6)
- Interim discussion included whether the Roundtable should decide chain direction or whether to run a community poll.
- Proposed next steps included Telegram polling:
- Poll 1: BASE vs BNB preference (Option 6)
- Poll 2: Which options should proceed to Snapshot
- Multi-vote enabling suggested; options meeting threshold (e.g., 5+ votes, subject to final decision) proceed to Snapshot.
- Vote timing discussed: end of call or by end of week via TG discussion.
Next Steps
Next meeting focus areas (consolidated):
- Confirm timing/format for DAO vote on forward-path options (including how to handle continued Shib IO silence).
- Finalize infra cost reductions ahead of Feb 2026 grant coverage change.
- Share Airdrop App beta testing outcomes and expected go-live timing.
- Determine polling + Snapshot plan (including BASE vs BNB decision process if Option 6 proceeds).
- Take Snapshot vote live with all options and be prepared to make changes based on the winning option.