WBTC DAO, the decentralized autonomous organization in charge of the Wrapped Bitcoin project, is being migrated to a new multi-signature smart contract, according to Victor Tran, CEO of Kyber Network. According to the team, the old multisig contract was dismantled because many of the original signers are no longer active, reducing the availability of the multisig.
A wrapped token is a cryptocurrency that has been tokenized. It is linked to the value of the asset it represents and can typically be redeemed (unwrapped) at any time. It typically represents an asset that does not exist natively on the blockchain on which it is issued.
Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC) enables Ethereum applications to include a cryptocurrency that is backed by actual bitcoin reserves. WBTC DAO is the autonomous organization in charge of changing smart contracts and adding or removing merchants and custodians.
Among the delisted signers are the defunct FTX exchange, Dharma, MakerDAO, and eight others, while Chainlink, Balancer, and Multichain are among the newcomers.
Tran claims that the migration was prompted by a pull request on the project's GitHub page. The new multisig contract will have 13 signers, with eight required to reach a consensus and complete a transaction. They will also be in charge of making any necessary changes to the wrapped token's contract.
Meanwhile, the migration comes as (WBTC) has lost its BTC peg since Sam Bankman-crypto Fried's exchange FTX declared bankruptcy on November 11. WBTC is currently trading 0.86% lower than BTC.
The prolonged de-pegging has alarmed the crypto community, with some observers blaming the issue on a significant lag in redemptions at BitGo, one of the major custodians for the Wrapped Bitcoin protocol.
WBTC is trading at $16,413.70 at the time of writing, with a 24-hour trading volume of $221,148,078.
