Dashboard & Use-case

Seeing as Spark was released by the MakerDAO team, the primary use-case is having good borrow APY for stablecoins, though other blue chip assets are also available (ETH and its LSTs, WBTC).

Users are also going to find that Spark has a slightly more conservative approach to risk management, as the LTV of the available asset is considerably lower than on other protocols.

Additionally, the fact that stablecoins and blue chip assets are the only ones available means that its doors are open for users who are looking to borrow with a lower risk-level, and lower borrowing rates.

Having a position on Spark with a qualifying collateral + debt combination can make users eligible for SPK airdrops, which is the Spark governance token. More information on this can be found within Spark's official documentation.

Simple and straightforward - just like opening a position on DeFi Saver:

Show me how:

Before opening a position on Spark, let's have an overview of the protocol's dashboard. Understanding all of the available options will help you get the most out of managing your position on DeFi Saver. So, you've navigated to Spark\s dashboard by clicking the icon in the sidebar, and are met with the following screen:

  • You'll be on the "Manage" tab first, which will let you manually manage your position by utilizing the available tools.

  • The "Automate" tab will take you to our Automation options.

  • The "Notify" tab will take you to the interface where you can set up custom-tailored notifications for your position.

Let's now move onto the metrics that will help you do an assessment of your position:

  • "Net APY" is a metric that represents the % by which your position's Net value will increase/decrease in a year based on the current Supply/Borrow APY.

  • You'll be able to choose the "risk ratio" that you'd like to view. For a breakdown of how ratios are calculated, please refer to this article. Health Ratio is calculated as: HR = Total Borrowed Value / (Total Collateral Value x Liquidation Threshold)

  • The right-hand side "Details" tab will give you a full breakdown of your position's details, including metrics like Liquidation ratio, Borrow power used, and let's you activate E-Mode. This is a feature that we will cover later on in the article.

  • The "Automations" tab will show you any activate automations you may have for your position, while "Rewards" will show you any claimable that might be available.

  • The "Rewards" tab will have any claimable Spark rewards for you to claim.

The final step before opening a position is to scroll down to the "Market" section:

This gives you a full overview of the available assets within the protocol, along with asset-specific metrics like:

  • Supply APY (how much interest you earn by supplying the asset as collateral)

  • Borrow APY (how much interest you pay for borrowing the asset)

  • Collateral Factor (the maximum amount you can borrow based on your collateral's value)

  • Liquidation Factor (the threshold that represents the value that your debt must remain under compared to your collateral - otherwise the position is liquidated)

  • Market info/size

We've now covered the basics of Spark's dashboard, so you're now ready to open a position. Let's dive right into how you can do that.

Clicking the "Create" button will take you to a new tab:

The interface is pretty straightforward - You'll be able to:

  • Select the asset you want to supply as collateral

  • The collateral amount

  • Select the asset you want to borrow

  • The borrow amount

  • View your position's metrics before opening it

If you'd rather opt to open a Leverage position, simply click on the "Leverage" tab:

The interface is a bit more complex than the first due to the nature of leveraging. Here, you can:

  • Select the asset you want to supply as collateral

  • The collateral amount

  • The leverage amount

  • The borrow amount

  • The exchange route (DeFi Saver will look to automatically find you the best one if you leave "Automatic")

  • The slippage limit

  • View your position's metrics before opening it

Whether you're ready to open a Borrow or Leverage position - the finishing touch will be clicking "Create"

If the transaction succeeds, you'll see the pop-up from above. You can feel free to press "Done" if you're not yet interested in turning on Automations.

If you're interested in Automations, please refer to our Knowledge Base articles that cover everything automation-related.

Now that the position is opened, the "Manage" tab will look like this:

The final part of the dashboard we'll cover are the manual management tools:

  • Boost - This tool is used to increase your exposure to the collateral asset when the safety ratio of your position increases. It does this by borrowing more of the debt asset, swapping it to the collateral asset, and supplying it to your current position.

  • Repay - This tool is used to increase the safety ratio of your position by swapping part of your collateral asset in order to repay part of the debt.

  • Supply - This tool is used to add more collateral to your position in order to increase the safety ratio.

  • Withdraw - This tool is used to withdraw collateral from your position, in turn decreasing your safety ratio

  • Borrow - This tools is used to borrow more of the debt asset from your current position, in turn decreasing your safety ratio.

  • Pay back - This tool is used to pay back part of (or the entirety) of your debt, in turn increasing your safety ratio.

By clicking the "+" "Add second action" button next to the tab for your current tool, you'll be able to combine actions into a single transaction:

Before executing any of these actions, the dashboard will provide you with updated metrics for your position based on the values you've input:

You're now well equipped to efficiently manage your Spark position on DeFi Saver!

We highly recommend reading through our Automation articles to get a better understanding of how you can further improve how your position is managed.

Spark gives users access to the E-Mode, which lets positions with correlated assets have a higher LTV, lower liquidation threshold and lower penalties. This option can easily be activated through DeFi Saver's dashboard:

Show me how:

We went in detail on how to open a position on Spark in the "Show me how" section above.

Before we cover how E-Mode is activated, let's quickly cover what it actually represents.

E-Mode is a feature that's used in cases where the collateral and debt asset are extremely close in value, if not a fully 1:1 value.

These pairings ensure that the position itself is inherently less risky, as there's a lower chance of the debt's value deviating from the collateral (causing a liquidation to trigger).

In turn, this means that the Loan-to-value (LTV) ratio can be higher, meaning you can borrow more with your collateral than you could with more volatile pairings. At the same time, it also ensures that the collateral ratio can be lower. Currently, E-Mode supports the following asset pairings:

  • ETH Correlated

  • Stablecoin Correlated

  • BTC Correlated

With a basic understanding of E-Mode, let's go into how you can activate it. There are two ways of activating E-Mode on DeFi Saver:

  • While you're opening/creating a position

  • After you've already opened a position

While you're opening a position, if you've selected price-correlated assets (for example, ETH-wstETH), you'll get an E-Mode checkbox (ETH correlated) that's on by default:

In case you've already opened an eligible position, but didn't activate E-Mode initially, you can do so by going to the main dashboard:

From here, you'll see "E-Mode" on the right-hand side. Click "Manage":

In this window, select the asset pair that's associated with your position, click "Enable E-Mode", and you'll be good to go.

If at any point you'd like to turn E-Mode off, follow the same steps as activating it , but just choose the "No E-Mode" option.

One of the main benefits of utilizing DeFi Saver's service is access to our automation options that maintain your position based on your personal inputs.

Automations have minimal debt requirements and their availability depends on the chain you're currently on.

Closing or Migrating your position:

The two remaining options on the dashboard that we haven't covered are Close and Migrate.

You also have the option to use the "Shift" option, which moves your position from one protocol to another. We have an entire segment dedicated to this feature, so if you're interested, please read through the Loan Shifter article.

If you decide to close down your current position, the steps are extremely straightforward:

  1. Navigate to the main dashboard:

  1. Select the "Close" button:

  1. Choose how you'd like to close your position.

  1. Since closing from your position involves swaps, you can also (optionally) set the exchange route and slippage limit.

  1. Press "Close Spark"

The "Close (to X)" represents which asset will be withdrawn to your EOA wallet once the position is fully closed. To understand this in more detail, let's look at how the "Close" tool works in the background:

  • First, it flash loans the debt asset

  • It uses the flash loaned funds to pay back all of the debt

  • Now that your collateral is freed up, it's withdrawn

  • The collateral is then swapped to the debt asset

  • This is used to pay back the flash loan

  • The remaining funds are withdrawn to your EOA

Now, if you choose "Close to (collateral asset)", this means that it will only swap enough of your collateral to cover the flash loan, but it will withdraw the rest in the collateral token. If you choose "Close to (debt asset)", it's going to swap all of your collateral to the debt asset, pay back the flash loan, and the rest will be withdrawn in the debt token.

To Migrate a position, visit the main dashboard, and click the three dots next to the "Close" option:

From there, you can choose the wallet you'd like to migrate the position to:

Once everything's good to go, click "Migrate".


  • Spark

  • Available assets & compatibility

  • What is sDAI?

  • Liquidations in Spark

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