This is the second of the Hub Weekly Thursday recaps, straight from the Hub Unit team, per the cadence we committed to in the From Chaos to Stability to Growth post.
Every Thursday, we will call out significant Cosmos Hub updates on the forum, with a short companion thread on X, recapping announcements, live events like validator or community calls, and ecosystem updates!
For more info see the linked posts and contact @RoboMcGobo on telegram to submit news for the weekly.
This week: tokenomics, the USDC migration working group, the validator program, and the first community call.
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A second update from the tokenomics research workstream with Gauntlet, including an update on how much of the existing ATOM supply data has been indexed and segmented into Cohorts
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A first set of public updates on the USDC Migration Working Group, including who is already live on Injective USDC, progress on the migration buildout, how teams currently on Noble USDC can join the coordination channel, and a recap of Friday’s Twitter Space with Injective and Cybernetics
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A delegation program update: all default delegations from the ICF are now fully rolled out, Q3 selection opens June 15 with a July 1 redelegation, and a reminder of the testnet participation requirement that activates with this cycle
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A recap of yesterday’s first monthly Community Call, including the Eureka EVM L2 timeline, the direction we are evaluating on a Hub-native order book DEX, and a hackathon coming soon
Tokenomics Phase 1: Cohort Analysis Now Attributes Roughly 22% of Daily Sell Pressure
Last week we shared the framework Gauntlet is using to attribute ATOM flows to specific cohorts and behaviors. This week’s biweekly produced the next layer of output: a first-pass attribution of daily sell pressure to some of the cohorts the framework defines.
Where the 22% comes from
The current analysis covers two cohorts in detail: ICO participants and mega whale stakers (wallets holding more than 1M ATOM). For each cohort, Gauntlet measures the wallet’s liquid ATOM balance and its outbound transfer share over the trailing 90 days, then multiplies the two to produce an “at-risk” estimate of liquid ATOM that has a meaningful chance of being sold.
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ICO participants hold roughly 2.1M liquid ATOM with an 85% outbound share, putting roughly 73k ATOM in the at-risk bucket.
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Mega whale stakers hold roughly 107M staked across the cohort
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Retail stakers, of which there are roughly 21,000 in the current sample, contribute essentially nothing to outbound flow, comparatively.
Combined, these cohorts now account for roughly 22% of daily ATOM sell pressure, against less than 1% in the prior round of analysis. Validator emissions contribute less than 0.1% of the same total. The target for the next two weeks is to continue to index data and push attribution past 50%.
This is still preliminary data.
The 22% figure will move once Gauntlet completes address labeling that distinguishes outbound transfers to CEX deposit addresses from outbound transfers to liquid staking contracts and self-owned wallets. It will also move as the cohort coverage expands beyond the current sample of the top 25 validators and their delegators (roughly 80,000 delegators in total). We are not treating any cohort-level number as final until labeling is complete.
USDC Migration: First Updates
The USDC migration working group announced last week is now forming. This section pulls together what teams on Noble USDC need to know about the migration path and the technical work in flight.
What is shipping in June
A practical near-term unblock for ecosystem teams: in June, the Cosmos Labs team is shipping the initial relayer integration for Skip:Go that will allow one-click CCTP v2 transfers that forward Injective USDC directly to dYdX and other Cosmos chains in a single user step. The work is being scoped alongside the injective team now.
Additionally, Both Kraken and Binance are actively working on support for Injective USDC. Neither has shared a firm timeline beyond “several months.”
How to join the coordination channel
We are using the working group to share migration tooling, timing, and updates in the open, so teams can plan around shared signals rather than ad-hoc DMs. Anyone impacted by the USDC migration is welcome to join:
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Blockchain teams
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Wallets and Infrastructure
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Top USDC applications
If your team falls into any of these buckets and wants in, reply to this thread or reach out on Telegram (@RoboMcGobo) or Slack to any of the Cosmos Labs team members. We are adding teams to the working group channel on a rolling basis and will share initial updates shortly. Many teams have already reached out, and we have already begun adding them to the channel.
Friday’s Twitter Space recap
On Friday, May 15, the Cosmos Hub hosted a Twitter Space alongside the Injective and Cybernetics teams to walk through the Injective USDC migration in detail. The Space drew roughly 700 to 900 concurrent viewers and is recorded. The replay is available here for anyone who missed it.
Delegation Program: Default Delegations Fully Rolled Out, Q3 Selection Opens June 15
A structural update for validators this week, with one important reminder on the requirements that activate the next cycle.
All default delegations from the ICF have now been rolled out. This concludes the first full cycle of the rebooted default delegations program, with delegations now fully executed. Thank you to every validator for your patience while we rolled out the program.
Q3 selection opens June 15, targeting a July 1 redelegation. In line with the quarterly cadence we committed to, the selection process for the next round will begin on June 15. The redelegation itself is targeted for July 1. As with the previous cycle, the goal is to compress the gap between selection and execution so the program delivers a clear, predictable signal to the validator set.
The testnet participation requirement activates with this cycle. To remain eligible for ICF default delegations from the July 1 cycle onward, validators must be onboarded to the Hub testnet program by June 15. The testnet program is the structural way we are aligning default delegations with active contribution to the Hub. To join the testnet program, visit Hypha Co-op’s website here.
How to engage and where to ask questions. Full details on the program, the points system, the testnet onboarding path, and the Q3 selection process live in the Cosmos Hub validator Telegram group. If you are not already in the group, DM @RoboMcGobo on Telegram for an invite. Questions on this section can also go to this thread; we will surface common questions and answers back into the validator group as they come up.
From Yesterday’s First Monthly Community Call: Eureka EVM L2 Expansion, an Order Book DEX Direction, and a Hackathon Coming
The first monthly community call ran yesterday on X, hosted by @RoboMcGobo and @madscientists_x. Here’s what was discussed
Eureka EVM L2 support is launching in a few weeks.
The IBC V2 / Eureka roadmap is on the cusp of a meaningful expansion. EVM L2 support, covering Base, Optimism, and Arbitrum among others, is currently in audit, and the team’s working assumption is a launch in a few more weeks. Solana integration follows shortly after EVM L2s. Post-unlock, our intention is to move aggressively on new Eureka connections to high-value chains. Solana is a no-brainer; a Base connection has been requested by the Osmosis team and is in scope.
The competitive framing for any team weighing IBC V2 against alternatives: LayerZero’s integration fees run into the millions, Chainlink CCIP integrations take several months end to end, and IBC V2 is targeting self-service, permissionless deployment that can be rolled out in a matter of hours. For Hub-connected chains, the enterprise vision is simple: deploy one connection to the Hub, get instant connectivity to every other Hub-connected chain.
The direction on a Hub-native DEX.
We discussed the architectural direction we are currently exploring for a Hub-native DEX. Although nothing is finalized, there are two things to share on how we’re thinking about it. First, the venue we are evaluating is an enterprise-grade order book, not an AMM. AMMs are insufficient for the institutional and legal use cases we are aligning the Hub against. Second, on open plugin architecture is an interesting way to involve retail builders in the Hub’s success: community DEXes could plug in as market makers and earn a share of institutional order flow fees, modeled loosely on the kind of integration patterns Duality and Astroport pioneered. None of the architectural choices are finalized, and an upcoming call will walk through the trade-offs in detail.
A Cosmos Hub hackathon is coming soon.
We will be co-sponsoring a Cosmos Hub hackathon run by the Mad Scientists community. The hackathon will lean into AI and vibe coding as a first-class participation path. If you have been on the fence about getting hands-on with tools like Claude Code or Codex, this is a good time to start. With AI, people with limited technical background can ship meaningful products during the event. More details to come soon.
That’s all for this week - thanks to everyone engaging across the forum, validator channels, and Telegram. Looking forward to next week’s update! Please let us know if you like the Weekly format, and what else you’d like to hear from us.
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Join the next community call: Register for the community calendar here