Colosseum Codex: Anchor 0.31.0, MetaDAO Launchpad, Squads Smart Account Program

At the time of this issue the highly-debated SIMD-0228 (Market-Based Emission Mechanism) looks like it's going to come down to the wire with just hours left to vote.

What seemed like an easy win for Yes votes early on has tightened to as close as 0.1% of the required 66.67% to pass. You can track the results on the SIMD Vote Status dashboard.

Here's the rest of this week's news for Solana builders...

⚓ Anchor 0.31.0

The final major release before Anchor v1 is here!

Anchor 0.31.0 introduces several important changes to enhance performance, compatibility, and usability for Solana developers.

Agave Transition:
With Solana v2.1.0, some binaries are transitioning to a new naming convention under the Agave project. The key change is that Solana’s solana-install utility is now deprecated and being replaced with agave-install.

If your toolchain is configured to use Solana v1.18.19 or later, the new Agave binaries will be automatically installed.

Automatic IDL Conversion:
Anchor 0.31.0 automatically converts old IDLs, so you don’t need to switch versions or run extra commands. The only exception is the anchor idl fetch command, which still requires manual conversion.

Improved Stack Memory Usage:
Stack memory issues have been a major pain point for developers, especially with the try_accounts function where instructions are deserialized, and constraints are checked.

• Optimized init constraints: Previously, init constraints generated a lot of inline code, consuming excessive stack space. Now, this logic runs inside a closure, creating a separate stack frame to significantly reduce memory usage.
• Reliable stack warnings: Before, some stack overflows wouldn't trigger warnings, leading to undefined behavior. Now, Solana v2 with Anchor 0.31.0 ensures reliable stack limit warnings, helping developers catch issues early.
• Improved compatibility with Rust & LLVM changes: Rust compiler updates had increased stack usage, lowering the threshold for stack-related issues and this update counteracts that problem.

Custom Discriminators:
Previously, Anchor enforced fixed 8-byte discriminators for accounts and instructions. While this was fine for most use cases, it wasted bytes in cases where smaller discriminators were sufficient, especially considering Solana’s 1232-byte transaction size limit.

Now, developers can define custom discriminator sizes to save space and optimize for their specific needs.

LazyAccount (Experimental):
LazyAccount is an experimental new account type designed for performance-focused applications that need faster deserialization.

How LazyAccount different from Account<T>:

• Skips unnecessary deserialization: Instead of deserializing the entire account immediately, LazyAccount only loads it when needed, reducing compute costs.
• Best for read-heavy applications: Ideal for programs that frequently fetch accounts but don’t modify them.

This is the final major update before Anchor v1, and streamlines development, enhances performance, and future-proofs Anchor for Solana v2 and beyond.

Anchor - Release Notes 0.31.0

🚀 MetaDAO Launchpad

MetaDAO has introduced a new launchpad designed to reshape token fundraising by leveraging futarchy governance. 

Instead of the typical ICO model where teams retain control over treasury funds, this system ensures funders, contributors, and the broader community all have a stake in decision-making and financial outcomes.

The launchpad operates on a straightforward premise: 

Founders propose a project idea and set a minimum USDC funding goal. Funders then have seven days to contribute. 

If the funding target is reached, contributors receive 10M project tokens pro-rata, and 10% of the raised USDC is used to create a liquidity pool with an additional 1M tokens. 

The remaining funds and token minting rights are placed under the control of a futarchy DAO, where contributors can submit on-chain proposals to compensate themselves over time.

If the funding goal isn’t met, contributors get their USDC back. If the founder walks away, anyone can raise a proposal to liquidate the treasury, ensuring contributors aren’t left holding worthless tokens.

This model addresses the core failures of past ICOs, where raised funds were often mismanaged or drained by teams without long-term incentives. 

The futarchy-based governance system prevents treasury exploitation by requiring proposal-based spending, where token holders who disagree with a decision can sell their stake, and only if supporters buy them out can the proposal pass.

The first project launching on this platform is mtnCapital, a tokenized investment DAO governed by on-chain futarchy proposals. The token sale is set for the week of March 31st.

For early-stage crypto founders, this launchpad offers a way to secure funding without losing community trust. Instead of just raising capital, projects gain an engaged user base from day one, with contributors having a vested interest in their success. 

MetaDAO's New Launchpad

👛 Squads Smart Account Program

The Smart Account Program is a programmable infrastructure for building smart contract wallets and stablecoin payment systems on Solana. The program is now live on mainnet, has been audited by OtterSec, and is formally verified by Certora.

The Smart Account Program enables developers to create programmable accounts with built-in policy controls, eliminating the constraints of standard keypairs while maintaining security and efficiency. 

Developers can define custom permissions, access controls, and automation rules within smart accounts. 

The Smart Account Program provides three key benefits for Solana developers:

1. Programmability & Control: Developers can create custom transaction policies for multi-sig wallets, recurring payments, and automated spending limits. This flexibility makes smart accounts useful for DeFi, payments, and embedded finance applications.
2. Cost Efficiency & Scalability: The atomic execution model eliminates unnecessary steps and fees, reducing deployment costs to as low as 0.0000025 SOL per wallet. With upcoming rent-free creation, developers can pre-generate wallets at scale with virtually no upfront cost.
3. Enterprise-Grade Security: Smart accounts support Solana keypairs, multi-party computation (MPC), and trusted execution environments (TEE). Planned authentication methods like passkeys, session keys, and secp256k1 support (for BTC & EVM wallets) will further expand security options.

To make building with smart accounts as easy as using standard keypairs, Squads provides an API that abstracts complexity. This API turns multi-step blockchain operations into simple REST API calls, handling account management, transaction building, and gas abstraction..

With the Squads Smart Account Program now live on mainnet, developers have access to the most advanced smart wallet infrastructure on Solana. 

Developers interested in early access to the Squads API can contact Squads Protocol to start integrating smart accounts.

Squads Smart Account Program: Live On Mainnet

⭐ Highlights of the Week

mtnDAO Launches mtnCapital
MtnDAO is launching MtnCapital, a futarchy powered investment fund where market-driven decision-making replaces traditional voting. MtnCapital will raise its entire treasury by selling all $MTN tokens to the public, ensuring complete decentralization.

Swig Smart Wallets
Swig, built by Anagram, is a smart wallet toolkit that offers programmability, automation, and flexible permissions for developers. It enables cross-chain signing, role-based access controls, gasless transactions, and embedded social sign-ins to streamline onboarding and user interactions while maintaining non-custodial security.

Finternet World Tour
The Finternet World Tour is bringing discussions on global financial interoperability to major Solana events in Cape Town, NYC, Da Nang, Budapest, Singapore, and Mumbai. The Finternet envisions a world where assets move seamlessly across financial systems. Developers can contribute through the Finternet sandbox, with Solana Foundation instagrants offering up to $1M in funding.

⚡ Quick Hits

Advanced Security Best Practices Using Squads - Squads

What If the Devs Actually Did Something? The $RICK Experiment Begins - @crabbylions

Announcing active support for Solana Exporter - @asymmetric_re

How to Write Useful Commit Messages - Refactoring English

Zeta Markets has shipped testnet for Bullet - Lightspeed

⚙️ Tools & Resources

lazy-account-example is an example of how Anchor 0.31.0's new LazyAccount can improve stack memory and compute usage.

goat is an open-source framework for connecting AI agents to any onchain app with support for Solana.

Bonding curve pinocchio is a simple bonding curve solana program written in Rust using the pinocchio framework with a simple constant product formula for illustration purposes.

💸 Funding

Rakurai, a Solana staking infrastructure project, has secured a $3 million seed round led by Anagram Ventures, with participation from Colosseum, Slow Ventures, Robot Ventures, and others to accelerate the rollout of Rakurai’s high-yield staking platform and high-performance nodes.

ATMTA, the team behind Star Atlas, has made a strategic equity investment in Shaga, a decentralized cloud gaming platform. This investment includes Star Atlas game assets and the $ATLAS token, reinforcing their commitment to expanding accessibility and driving user acquisition.

Nomadz has been awarded a grant from the Solana Foundation Ukraine Grants Program, with support from KumekaTeam, to help expand payment options, optimize database performance, and onboard new users to the platform.

👩‍🔧 Get Hired

• Dev.fun is hiring a product growth hustler and a UX designer
• Kuzco is hiring a Senior Software Engineer to design and implement Kuzco's user-facing applications and website
• Syndica is hiring a Senior Rust Engineer - Infra Team to build and maintain web services that process API requests at scale

📅 Event Calendar

Accelerate! Solana Across America Episode 2, Virtual, Mar 18
Episode 2 of Solana Across America features new Accelerate NYC alpha, live announcement of the "Proof of USA" contest winners, and more surprises.

🎧 Listen to This

The Y-Axis Podcast

Lucas Bruder is co-founder and CEO of Jito Labs, a pioneering force in Solana's blockchain ecosystem. 

Under his leadership, Jito has grown with Solana through MEV innovations and liquid restaking solutions, with the Jito Block Engine now processing 94% of network stake. Jito has generated an additional $750m in revenue for validators in the Solana network. Jito tips accounted for around 50% of revenue on the network in 2024.

Lucas shares his journey into crypto, the founding of Jito Labs, and how his team built the first MEV bot on Solana. 

Lucas shares his thoughts on MEV mechanics, transaction efficiency, the impact of spam transactions on network performance, how Solana’s transaction processing changed with Jito’s innovations, the ongoing mempool controversy and how it aligns incentives within Solana’s ecosystem.

This episode provides an in-depth look at Jito’s impact on Solana’s infrastructure and offers valuable insights for aspiring crypto entrepreneurs.

Lucas Bruder: American Crypto, MEV, Solana, and Jito

Bonus Episodes

How Baxus Is Bringing Whiskey Onchain | Tzvi Wiesel - Lightspeed

Tzvi Wiesel joins Lightspeed to discuss building a great consumer app in crypto, the Baxus playbook, and how Tzvi is creating an onchain market place for the world's most collectible spirits.

From Memecoin to Mobile App: Moonwalk - 100xDevs

Swolsol, CTO of Moonwalk, talks about his journey from Web2 to Web3, building fitness-focused blockchain apps, making crypto accessible to everyone, his insights on Solana development, AI in Web3, and product strategies for mainstream adoption.

The Real Reason Jupiter Burned $3.5B - Meow & Kash from Jupiter - When Shift Happens

Meow and Kash from Jupiter break down their $700M+ airdrop, why it was about more than just free money, and how their infrastructure is bringing all of crypto into one place. They also reveal the strategy behind Jupiter’s massive $3.5B burn and how Jupnet is set to revolutionize multi-chain trading.

Follow @mikehale on X or Warpcast!

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