Dai (DAI) price, chart and history
Dai is $1.00, up 0.00% in the last 24 hours. Market value $4.60 billion, rank #34.
About Dai
DAI is a stablecoin: a cryptocurrency designed to stay worth about one US dollar. It runs mainly on Ethereum and is used for saving, trading, lending and payments in decentralized finance apps, where people want the convenience of crypto without its price swings. Unlike stablecoins such as USDC or USDT, DAI is not issued by a company holding dollars in a bank; it is created by a set of smart contracts when users borrow against crypto they deposit.
DAI comes from MakerDAO, a project started in 2014 by Danish entrepreneur Rune Christensen. The first version, backed only by Ether, launched in December 2017, and a multi-collateral version followed in November 2019. Control gradually moved from the founding Maker Foundation to holders of the MKR governance token. In August 2024 the project rebranded as Sky and introduced USDS as DAI's successor, while DAI kept circulating and MKR was later replaced by a new SKY token.
To create DAI, a user locks up more value in collateral than they borrow, for example $150 of crypto for $100 of DAI. If the collateral's value falls too far, it is sold off automatically to keep every DAI backed. Fees, savings rates and collateral rules are set by governance votes. Risks include sudden crashes that overwhelm liquidations, as in March 2020, heavy reliance on USDC and other real-world assets, and concerns that governance is concentrated among a few large holders.
- Created by
- MakerDAO (now Sky), founded by Rune Christensen
- Launched
- December 18, 2017 (multi-collateral version: November 2019)
- How it's backed
- Over-collateralized loans: users lock crypto and other approved assets in smart contracts to mint DAI
- Supply
- No fixed cap; DAI is created when users borrow and destroyed when loans are repaid
- Successor
- USDS, introduced when MakerDAO rebranded as Sky in 2024