SushiSwap (SUSHI) is an audited Decentralized Exchange (DEX) and DeFi (Decentralized Finance) protocol described as "Uniswap meets Yield Farming" with SUSHI tokenomics. The protocol's native token SUSHI is used to govern the platform. SUSHI holders also receive a portion of the trading fees on SushiSwap.

Background

The two functions that SUSHI has are: entitling holders to governance rights and a portion of the fees paid to the protocol. In a simplified way, SUSHI holders own the protocol.

Farming SUSHI began on August 29, 2020.

It was forked from Uniswap and created by the pseudonymous Chef Nomi (SushiSwap). Within three days of its announcement, SushiSwap accumulated over 1 billion worth of value locked into the protocol.

As of September 1, 2020, SushiSwap is an unaudited project. [7] [12] and September 3, PeckShield just completed the SushiSwap audit with all identified issues confirmed or fixed.

In December of 2020, SushiSwap announced a merger with yEarn. This follows high profiles collaborations between yEarn and other protocols like COVER Protocol, Pickle Finance, Cream Finance, Akropolis, and others. yEarn is creating an xSushi vault to farm SUSHI, Ether (ETH), YFI, and Wrapped BTC (wBTC). Keep3r Network will add its treasury to SushiSwap. COVER Protocol is adding insurance for SushiSwap liquidity pools through their system of CLAIM tokens and Cream Finance will provide liquidity and add SushiSwap Liquidity pool tokens as collateral for lending.

Controversy

Around early September, Chef Nomi acquired access to $27 million in Sushi tokens. The amount held by the lead in the company became mildly worrisome, as many had questions regarding why they held full access to this amount. Chef Nomi, in a Discord statement, stated,

In theory I can sell all of them, but I don't see anything wrong with it. It's the devshare and it's [been] specified in there since the beginning. It's not like I'm hiding that or anything. I [will] also spend for 2 audits. I will spend for the grants I just published a few hours ago.

A few days after this statement was made, SUSHI had suffered a loss in price per token due to Chef Nomi's mass selloff of around $13 million in dev funds. Many were suspecting that this was an exit scam from the creator, despite them denying that that was the case, and stating that they deserved the dev fund for creating the project. People in the DeFi space were not very pleased with the lack of transparency from SUSHI leaders. Many critics, including yEarn creator Andre Cronje, expressed his criticism towards the action, stating,

All you did so far was hand over a token that was built off of Uniswap Protocol. Weren't the funds meant to further develop? Aren't you that developer? [19]
In addition to the selloff, the SushiSwap contract was officially transferred to Sam Bankman-Fried, after Chef Nomi gave it up. They were the sole owner of the contract prior to this exchange.

On September 11, 2020, Chef Nomi returned $14 million in funds to the SushiSwap community. Additionally, they apologized to the community for their actions. In a statement, they explained

I have returned all the $14M worth of ETH back to the treasury. And I will let the community decide how much I deserve as the original creator of SushiSwap. In any currency (ETH/SUSHI/etc). With any lockup schedule you wish.

They added that they would continue to support the project 'behind the scenes.' Meaning, they are going to continue working on the project's development.

SushiSwap (SUSHI) is an audited Decentralized Exchange (DEX) and DeFi (Decentralized Finance) protocol described as "Uniswap meets Yield Farming" with SUSHI tokenomics. The protocol's native token SUSHI is used to govern the platform. SUSHI holders also receive a portion of the trading fees on SushiSwap.