Ribbon is a crypto derivatives platform that helps users access complex DeFi investment strategies. It offers several options products to achieve varying risk-return objectives.
Ribbon's core product are its Theta Vaults which run an automated options selling strategy. These vaults earn yield on a weekly basis through writing out-of-the-money (OTM) options and colleting the premiums. Users simply deposit their assets into a vault and it will automatically start running a specific options strategy. This reduces the majority of high gas fees as the vault socializes the gas costs across all vault depositors. Theta Vaults relies on Opyn oTokens, which are ERC-20 tokens that represent an options contract. Each oToken has a strike price and expiry date. oToken holders have the right to redeem some amount of the underlying asset if the strike price is hit. In order to run an options selling strategy, the vaults need to be able to mint and short oTokens. As such, the vault uses the deposited funds to lock collateral into Opyn and mint oTokens. It then sells them for a premium which is used to pay vault depositors their yield. The vault's collateral will be locked until the expiry of the oToken.
Ribbon takes 10% performance fees and 2% management fees. Half of the protocol revenue is sent to the treasury while the other half gets converted to ETH and distributed to RBN stakers (veRBN).
You can generate yield by depositing assets into Ribbon's Theta Vaults to collect option premiums and staking rewards. veRBN holders can also earn 50% of all protocol fees by staking RBN on the platform.