IMPORTANT UPDATE
As per Aquarius governance voting on gov.aqua.network, the community has voted for a proposal to change the snapshot date to January 15, 2022, at 00:00:00 UTC. All references to the old snapshot date have been changed in this article to reflect this adjustment. To find out more, read our Airdrop #2 — Important Updates! article.

UPDATE 2
There is a growing list of exchanges participating in Airdrop #2. You can find a list of these exchanges over in our Participating Exchanges article.

♒ About Aquarius

As you may know, Aquarius adds a liquidity management layer to Stellar.

Our mission is to increase the liquidity of important markets on the Stellar network. Aquarius introduces incentives for market makers and liquidity providers on Stellar, as well as a way for the Stellar community to control where this liquidity flows.

Through verifiable on-chain voting, the community selects markets where liquidity is needed, and the Aquarius protocol incentivizes liquidity providers to participate with rewards in AQUA.

AQUA tokens power the Aquarius protocol. It’s the currency for governance and rewards for Aquarius, although we believe it will play an even more important role in the future of the Stellar ecosystem.

We are getting closer to the launch of Aquarius, as mentioned in our previous blog post. Various elements will be launched in the weeks ahead, turning Aquarius into a fully functioning system during Q4 2021.

📦 AQUA Distribution

The majority of AQUA tokens are reserved as rewards for market makers and liquidity providers. Similar to how Bitcoin miners receive block rewards for supporting and securing the network, Aquarius liquidity miners will earn AQUA rewards for their useful work of supporting liquidity on Stellar. This helps Aquarius on its mission to be a liquidity management layer for the Stellar network.

At the same time, it’s users of the Stellar network who will decide where all this liquidity should flow. They have demands and interests when using specific Stellar assets, and it’ll be their say that directs liquidity miners.

Aquarius voters need to be aligned with the interests of the Stellar network. That’s why it was important for 20% of the total AQUA supply to be reserved for airdrops to the Stellar community.

So far, we have been distributing AQUA tokens to Stellar accounts that have historically interacted with the Stellar Decentralized Exchange (SDEX). The first airdrop distribution started in August 2021 and continues until January 2022. If you used the Stellar DEX before 2021, take a look at our Airdrop Checker Tool to see if you qualify, as you might still be able to claim some AQUA.

5% of the total AQUA supply (5B AQUA) was allocated to the first airdrop, with many users taking part and claiming 1.35 billion tokens so far. Any unclaimed tokens from the airdrop will go to the DAO Community Fund for later use by AQUA holders. The DAO wallet already holds over 1B AQUA tokens, and we expect this number to double by the end of the initial airdrop distribution.

The first airdrop was retroactive and focused on early users of the Stellar DEX. This helped us bootstrap a wide network of AQUA holders, with over 35,000 users now holding tokens. Now is the time to bring an even bigger AQUA airdrop to a wider group of users.

What is the biggest group aligned with the Aquarius mission of bringing more liquidity to the Stellar network? The answer is simple — the holders of the native currency of the network, Stellar Lumens.

💫 AQUA Airdrop #2 to XLM holders

Today we are announcing our final AQUA airdrop to the Stellar community.

Here are the key facts about airdrop #2:

• During this airdrop, AQUA tokens will be distributed to Stellar Lumens (XLM) holders.
• Eligible users must have a balance of at least 500 XLM (or yXLM) and at least 1 AQUA.
• Airdrop #2 is three times bigger than the first one, with 15% of the AQUA supply (15B AQUA) up for grabs.
• Every eligible user will receive a share of the 15B AQUA tokens allocated for this airdrop. Unclaimed AQUA goes to the DAO fund.
• We will take a snapshot of the Stellar network on January 15, 2022, at 00:00:00 UTC.
• Distribution will be made using claimable balance payments on the Stellar network. This is the same method used in the Initial Airdrop.
• Once distribution starts, it will continue for three years (36 months).
• Any Stellar wallet is supported. However, some exchanges might not be supporting this airdrop. We will keep you posted about exchanges that support AQUA airdrop #2.

We are extremely excited about this announcement. This will be the last airdrop event for Aquarius and another great opportunity to get free AQUA.

Unlike the initial airdrop, eligibility for airdrop #2 won’t be defined from a snapshot of a past ledger. This time everyone has the chance to participate, even those not currently using Stellar. This snapshot will take place roughly two months from now, giving plenty of time for Stellar users to prepare.

Once distribution starts, it will continue for three years. Airdrop rewards will be divided into equal portions and delivered over 36 months. Distribution will start no later than February 1, 2022, and we will announce the start date shortly after the snapshot occurs.

By taking part in this airdrop, you will keep receiving AQUA to help power Aquarius over the course of three years.

🙋How much AQUA will I get if I am eligible?

That’s a great question. To recap, here are the eligibility rules:

Hold a balance of at least 500 XLM (or yXLM) AND at least 1 AQUA on January 15, 2022.

Every eligible user will receive a share of the 15 billion AQUA tokens allocated for this airdrop. So this pool will be split between the participants proportionally to their balances at the time of the snapshot. Taking a simple example, a user holding 5,000 XLM will receive 5 times more AQUA than a user holding 1,000 XLM.

This also means the exact number of AQUA you will receive will depend not only on your balance but also on the number of participants and their balances at the time of the snapshot.

In the current airdrop plan, only 1 AQUA is needed to signal that you would like to participate in the airdrop. However, there is a good argument that a person already holding AQUA tokens believes in the Aquarius mission and deserves additional benefits. We received several requests from community members on this topic and are still evaluating proposals to incorporate AQUA tokens with this airdrop. Join our Discord to get involved with all Aquarius related discussions.

You can check the eligibility of your Stellar wallet by entering the public key on our Airdrop #2 statistics page.

📒 Terms & Conditions

Some terms & conditions need to be applied to keep rewards balanced and fair across the ecosystem. Whale accounts, uncirculated XLM, and exchanges will need limitations to prevent adverse effects to both airdrop claimants and AQUA token holders.

🐳 Whale Wallets

There is a cap of 10 million AQUA per wallet. No matter how much XLM the wallet holds, the max amount of AQUA received in this airdrop is limited to 10M AQUA.

🌌 Undistributed XLM & yXLM

All Stellar accounts holding undistributed (uncirculated) XLM & yXLM will be exempt from this airdrop.

👛 Supported Wallets

You can hold your XLM in any Stellar wallet. As long as you have an AQUA trustline and at least 1 AQUA on your balance, you will be recorded in the snapshot and will get claimable balance payments.

We highly recommend using a Stellar wallet that supports claimable balances. This is important as this functionality is needed to claim your airdrop.
Recommended products include:
LOBSTR, StellarX, StellarTerm, NiceTrade, Account Viewer, or Stellar Laboratory.

We will add to this list as more interfaces integrate the claimable balance feature.

👩‍🌾 yXLM

Since yXLM is backed 1:1 by XLM, it will be treated equally to XLM for this airdrop. This means yXLM holders can also participate in Airdrop #2, with no interruption caused to their yield earning. If you are a holder of yXLM already, you only need to add at least 1 AQUA to your wallet balance.

💱 Exchanges

Not every centralized exchange will support this AQUA airdrop, and we recommend reaching out to your exchange and checking if they are participating. If not, you can always move your lumens to your Stellar wallet or another participating exchange to claim the airdrop.

We are already in contact with multiple exchanges, educating them on our project. If an exchange agrees to take part, we will announce it on our social media channels.

Exchanges supporting this airdrop and agreeing to honor the distribution to their users will be exempt from the max AQUA cap described in the “Whale Wallets” section.

Users of participating exchanges only need to hold XLM on the exchange to be eligible for the airdrop, as the exchange’s Stellar wallets hold the 1 AQUA needed to signal the airdrop on chain. Exchanges will distribute AQUA to their users in accordance with their internal snapshot of users' XLM holdings on January 15, 2022, at 00:00:00 UTC.

Exchanges can contact us through our social media channels or by e-mail at airdrop@aqua.network.

Participating exchanges can be found in our Participating Exchanges article

🗞 What’s next?

Now that you’re all informed on Airdrop #2, you might want to read our other articles about AQUA’s goals, upcoming updates, tokenomics, and the Initial Airdrop that is still running:

• Introducing Aquarius
• AQUAnomics
• Introducing the Initial AQUA Airdrop
• Aquarius Progress Update

We’re really looking forward to the future of Aquarius, with more features being added like AMM rewards, DAO Voting, and integrations with other products across the Stellar ecosystem.

You can learn more and keep up to date with the team & community using the following links:

• Website
• Medium
• Twitter
• Discord
• Reddit
• Telegram

Thank you and welcome to Aquarius ✌️