what's High Gain?
High Gain is an automated yield optimization vault developed by KelpDAO, designed to maximize returns on Ethereum deposits through strategic DeFi integrations. Users can deposit ETH with a single click to receive hgETH tokens, which represent their share in the vault's managed positions. The vault employs active management to allocate funds across lending protocols, liquidity pools, and restaking opportunities, adapting to market conditions for optimal performance. The underlying mechanics involve leveraging restaked ETH (rsETH) and other assets to capture incentives from ecosystems like EigenLayer, Aave, and Balancer. hgETH maintains liquidity and composability, allowing holders to use it in further DeFi activities while earning compounded rewards. KelpDAO's expertise in restaking ensures diversified exposure to high-yield strategies without requiring users to manage positions manually. As part of KelpDAO's broader Gain suite, High Gain focuses on growth-oriented tactics, distinguishing it from more conservative vaults by prioritizing aggressive reward capture in volatile markets.
High Gain offers sbUSD with ~10% APR for USDC/USDT deposits, auto-rebalanced across Aave, Morpho, restaking.
Links
x.com/kelpdaoOffers sbUSD token with approximately 10% APR for USDC/USDT deposits, auto-rebalanced across Aave, Morpho, and restaking protocols.
Integrated smart-contract risk coverage via Nexus Mutual.
Achieved approximately $55 million in TVL in the ETH vault.
Supply cap on Aave v3 Avalanche market increases to 20k wrsETH after the 10k cap filled quickly.
Supply cap on Aave v3 Avalanche market increases to 10k wrsETH after the initial 5k cap filled quickly.
The wrsETH market on Tydro platform (Ink blockchain) has maxed out supply caps, with caps scheduled to increase soon.
rsETH maxes 60k ETH supply cap on Arbitrum Aave v3 reaching $183.9M TVL while Airdrop Gain adds institutional strategies from k3_capital and august_digital. DRIP Epoch 7 launches with ~2M ARB incentives and rsETH expands to Ink chain with Tydro and Velodrome integrations.
Integration with Aave v3 launches on Avalanche network with a 5k wrsETH supply cap.
A wrsETH <> ETH concentrated liquidity pool launches on Etherex platform.
hgETH token integrates with Pendle Finance and Euler Finance to boost rewards across these platforms while vault positions continue growing.
An rsETH market rate oracle from Chainlink is used to drain a couple million dollars of wstETH from KelpDAO and MoonwellDeFi protocols this week.
In the last 7 days, High Gain and Airdrop Gain deliver some of the highest reward rates among all ETH vaults exceeding $25M TVL.
KERNEL Season 3 airdrop is live for wallets with 500+ Kernel Points. Stable Gain stablecoin vault launches with $7M TVL offering 20% rewards, wrsETH expands to Avalanche achieving $25M TVL, KERNEL/KRW pair lists on Upbit, and Kred Litepaper releases introducing KUSD stablecoin launching Q4 2025 with Chainlink CCIP and PoR integration.
A mispricing incident occurred with wrsETH on Moonwell, prompting supply and borrow caps to be effectively zeroed out on Base and OP Mainnet to prevent further exploitation of the mispricing.
Sprint #4 of Kernel Kollective offers ~$5,300 in rewards (7.5 KING tokens) through quests with Kelp & Gain on a month-long leaderboard ending December 4.
Kelp confirms its operations and vault funds are unaffected by a recent exploit impacting Balancer and Beets v2 pools, though affected liquidity will be restored shortly. Users are advised to avoid Balancer and Beets pools until the issue is resolved, with migration options coming soon.
KelpDAO highlights the ETH vault delivering 20% rewards versus 5% market average, built with Upshift and UltraYield as part of the $2B+ Kernel DAO ecosystem with full liquidity and no lockups.
Upshift holds $150M+ in rsETH through integration with KelpDAO's restaked ETH token on their institutional-grade yield platform.
wrsETH is now live on Plasma, adding a new integration point for the wrapped restaking token.
Total Value Locked reaches approximately $25M on the Avalanche network.
KUSD stablecoin launches with native cross-chain transfers between BNB Chain and Ethereum powered by Chainlink CCIP. Chainlink selected as official oracle provider, integrating Price Feeds for secure markets and Proof of Reserve for near real-time collateral verification.
Integration with Aave v3 launches on Plasma with a supply cap of 20k wrsETH, of which 15.42k has already been supplied.
$KUSD, a rewards-bearing stablecoin backed by real-world receivables, is planned for launch in the coming months as the core of Kred's credit layer for real-world payments.
wrsETH launches on Plasma platform through 0xfluid protocol, enabling liquidity provision with combined staking and lending rewards for the wrsETH-ETH vault.
Gain prepares to launch stablecoin vaults targeting yields above 20% APR. Kernel Infra currently supports $150M in restaking infrastructure on BNB Chain.
Kred report published detailing on-chain credit system with contributions from Ethereum Foundation and Chainlink team members; TVL stands at $2.4B+ across KernelDAO products.
Kernel DAO releases official report introducing KUSD, a fully collateralized rewards-bearing stablecoin verified by Chainlink and built on Ethereum, with contributions from Ethereum Foundation Enterprise.
wrsETH goes live on Avalanche network with a wrsETH-WETH.e concentrated liquidity pool on BlackholeDex offering 2x Kernel Points plus AVAX and Black rewards.
wrsETH launches on Avalanche blockchain, expanding the LRT to a new DeFi ecosystem with additional reward and liquidity opportunities.
3,520 KERNEL tokens deployed as incentives in Equilibria's voting market, enabling vlEQB holders to direct vePENDLE emissions toward rsETH, agETH, and hgETH pools while earning 1.5 Kernel Points per 500 vlEQB voted.
hgETH vault maintains 11-14% reward rates while Airdrop Gain vault onboards K3 Capital as curator achieving ~8.4% returns. rsETH expands to Plasma mainnet and launches multiple new integrations including Pendle PT markets via Giza Tech, Arbitrum DRIP campaign, Enjoyoors platform, and Fluid liquidity vaults with 2x Kernel Points, with Kred litepaper scheduled for October release.
KelpDAO allocates 750 USDC in incentives across rsETH, agETH, and hgETH tokens to maintain boosted APYs, with vlEQB holders earning 1.5 Kernel Points per 500 vlEQB votes through Equilibria platform integration.
wrsETH becomes the #1 ETH asset on Aave v3 Linea market with over $360 million supplied, marking the 4th time supply caps have been maxed out with new capacity now available.
The protocol is positioned as part of KernelDAO's expanded ecosystem alongside new products including $KUSD stablecoin and Kred credit layer, with the protocol contributing LRT yield to the overall $KERNEL token value capture. KernelDAO announces an upcoming whitepaper launch detailing this ecosystem expansion.
Large outflow of 11,000 ETH worth $50.4 million transferred from the protocol to an unknown wallet.
A whale deposits 13,561 ETH valued at $62.4 million to the protocol from an unknown wallet.
A whale transfers 13,667 ETH worth approximately $61.7 million from an unknown wallet to the protocol.
Large whale transfers 10,991 ETH worth $51.2 million to the protocol from an unknown wallet.
Partnership announced with Pulse, an automated capital allocation agent that deploys capital into Kelp markets and PT-rsETH positions on Pendle.
Kelp DAO partners with Theoriq, Gauntlet, and Morpho Labs in the AlphaVault system, contributing allocation spreading functionality to the automated DeFi vault.
KERNEL rewards increase 9% to 3,900 tokens across rsETH, agETH, and hgETH pools, reversing previous reduction trend.
KERNEL rewards decrease to 3,585 tokens across rsETH, agETH, and hgETH pools, marking 48% reduction from previous 6,900 token allocation.
Whale deploys 3,300 KERNEL tokens to boost rewards across multiple LSD pools.
rsETH now accepted as collateral for minting USND stablecoin on Arbitrum through Nerite protocol.
Vaults generate $1.2M+ USDC yield over 52-week period through ETH staking operations.
New rsETH trading live on Polynomial platform offering triple rewards: yield, OP tokens, and 2x Kernel Points.
Voting incentives increase to 6,900 KERNEL with new 1.5x point multiplier for vlEQB voters.
New hgETH(Gain) pool launches on Pendle offering 17% APY and 2x KERNEL points rewards.
Voting incentives increase to 6,180 KERNEL tokens across three pools, up 20% from previous epoch.
New voting epoch launches with increased rewards of 5,145 KERNEL tokens for rsETH, hgETH, and agETH pools.
New voting incentive program launches on Equilibria with 4,260 KERNEL rewards for rsETH, agETH, and hgETH pool voters.
Reward rates increase to 8.3% due to higher restaking activity, with select vaults offering 15% rewards.
Warning: Project exhibits characteristics associated with poor airdrop performance - VC funding, restaking focus, and simplified user experience indicate potential yield limitations.
Season 3 launches with 1% token allocation across Kernel, Kelp, and Gain protocols, introducing new liquidity incentives.
New Chainlink integration enforces 1:1 collateralization and enables lending protocols to verify reserves in real-time.
Protocol bug results in excess rETH minting to fee address during upgrade. No funds lost.
Security incident triggers SteakhouseFi to remove rsETH exposure from vaults.
New stablecoin vault launching in May offering 15-20% rewards, backed by 600k ETH TVL.
KERNEL token airdrop distribution is complete.
$KERNEL token is now live; traders advised to verify all communications through official channels due to increased scammer activity.
EigenLayer implements 14-day withdrawal delay starting April 17; buffer pool provides instant liquidity option.
New token launches with 2B TVL and 300M market cap; active airdrop for rsETH stakers.
KERNEL token launches with TGE and lists on Binance and KuCoin.
New integration with TAC's external vaults enables native TON yield opportunities without bridges.
KERNEL token airdrop claims are now live with allocations based on points system.
Token claims launch with mandatory 2-minute video requirement, followed by immediate selling pressure.
Imminent TGE launches on Binance with $1.5B TVL and confirmed ecosystem airdrops from YieldNestFi and Mira.
Second largest LRT protocol on Ethereum with 600,000+ ETH in deposits and part of $2B+ TVL ecosystem.
New rsETH looping capabilities launched against wstETH and ETH pairs on Spark protocol mainnet.
600k+ ETH staked makes protocol second largest LRT on Ethereum with $660M+ TVL in ecosystem.
KERNEL TGE scheduled for April 14, combining three protocols with $3B TVL.
Token Generation Event scheduled for April 14th with Binance listing and 4-year team vesting period.
Token Generation Event scheduled for Q2 2025.
Active voting period offers $1,000 in incentives plus 2 Kernel Points per 500 vlEQB used.
rsETH trading now available on Napier Finance with June 2025 maturity.
High-risk project with poor token allocation structure and concerning staking program fundamentals.
Token misallocation issue under active discussion with team; resolution expected in April.
$KERNAL airdrop eligibility checker launches, enabling users to verify potential token claims.
KERNEL airdrop checker live, 10% goes to users with Points/Miles.
Kernel DAO (project behind Kelp DAO) released its airdrop checker.
KelpDAO has postponed its TGE to March 2025. Airdrop checker planned for next week, with details on token unlocks and distribution to follow.
Launched High Growth Vault offering ~20%+ APY on ETH using strategies across Aave, Pendle and more.
Offering $1,500 in USDC rewards plus Kelp Miles for rsETH pools voting. 2,000 Kelp Miles per 500 vlEQB voted.