“Imagine a DeFi summer that never ends, with tokenomics that don't implode, where community-driven governance is actually interesting, and community-driven growth brings users to underlying business models that actually make sense.”
Rune Christensen is the co-founder and CEO of MakerDAO, which he created together with Nikolai Mushegian in 2014. MakerDAO is a decentralized autonomous organization that issues an Ethereum-based stablecoin called Dai, which is collateral-backed and soft-pegged to the U.S. dollar.
When he was 18, Christensen moved to China, where he co-founded Try China — a company providing international recruiting — while studying biochemistry at the University of Copenhagen. He managed the company from 2011 to 2014. Christensen discovered Bitcoin early in 2011, and after realizing its value, he decided to sell his Chinese business to invest in the digital asset.
After losing Bitcoin to the 2014 Mt. Gox hack, he believed that the technology was still worth it but that stablecoins could be a more viable, steady option than cryptocurrencies. This led to the creation of MakerDAO, a decentralized finance protocol that attempts to provide a better, more transparent financial system globally.
2022 was a challenging year for the cryptocurrency market, with the collapses of multiple crypto exchanges and platforms challenging consumers’ trust in the industry. MakerDAO also experienced difficulties, for reasons beyond the global and cryptocurrency industry crises.
Increasing regulatory efforts put pressure on MakerDAO, especially after the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned and blocked access to crypto mixer Tornado Cash in August.
Dai is primarily backed by USDC and has reserves in ETH, both of which could be frozen if found to be connected to Tornado Cash, so there were concerns that MakerDAO could be affected if it were deprived of those reserve funds.
Further to the Tornado Cash issue, Christensen advanced a proposal to depeg Dai from the dollar and link it to ETH instead, which caused significant discontent in the MakerDAO community. The process was initiated, and accumulating ETH will remain a focus for the organization over the next two to three years in preparation for the dollar depeg. In October, co-founder Mushegian drowned in Puerto Rico, leaving Christensen to lead the project into the future on his own.
Christensen spent the last few months of 2022 preparing to leave MakerDAO, or at least limit his role within the organization. His likely departure was outlined in his “Endgame Plan.”
He won the community’s support despite many voters declaring that they did not understand what they were voting for. The Endgame will take shape in 2023 and help the project become more decentralized, hopefully ensuring more stability for Dai.
What Christensen will do after stepping down from the leadership of MakerDAO is yet to be determined. His engagement with environmental issues and promotion of nuclear energy to save the planet will undoubtedly play a significant role in his life over the next few months, as expressed in many of his tweets.
