How to return funds to the Community Pool (IBC USDT)

[paranjko]

A while back I was helping the DeAI Nation folks with their proposal. Their event ended up being cancelled, and to their credit they decided to do the right thing and return the granted funds to the Community Pool.

Turns out there was no guide for that. The tricky part: their grant was paid out through a governance proposal, and USDT on Gonka comes out of the USDT treasury contract — there is no way to simply send it back into that contract. So where do the funds go? The answer is the Community Pool via fund-community-pool (note that a plain bank send to the distribution module address will not credit the pool either). We figured it out about a month ago, and I finally found the time to write it down properly.

Sharing the instruction below in case anyone else ever needs it. Hopefully returning funds in cases like this stays the norm in our network.

By the way, check out their DeAI Dashboard: they track decentralized AI networks side by side, Gonka included!

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Returning IBC USDT to the Gonka Community Pool

These instructions are for returning IBC USDT funds (originally received via governance proposal) back to the Gonka community pool.

Public Endpoints:

• RPC: https://node3.gonka.ai/chain-rpc/
• API: https://node3.gonka.ai/chain-api/

Step 1: Verify Your Balance

First, confirm that your wallet holds the IBC USDT funds:

curl https://node3.gonka.ai/chain-api/cosmos/bank/v1beta1/balances/<YOUR_GONKA_ADDRESS>

Look for a balance with the denom:

ibc/115F68FBA220A028C6F6ED08EA0C1A9C8C52798B14FB66E6C89D5D8C06A524D4

The amount shown is in micro-USDT (6 decimal places). For example, 1000000 = 1 USDT.

Step 2: Fund the Community Pool

Important: Before returning the full amount, test the flow with a small amount first.

Chain behavior, CLI syntax, endpoints, gas settings, and wallet support may change over time. Send a small test transaction, verify that it appears in the Community Pool, and only then return the remaining funds.

Use the inferenced CLI to send the funds to the community pool:

inferenced tx distribution fund-community-pool \
  <AMOUNT>ibc/115F68FBA220A028C6F6ED08EA0C1A9C8C52798B14FB66E6C89D5D8C06A524D4 \
  --from <YOUR_KEY_NAME_OR_ADDRESS> \
  --chain-id gonka-mainnet \
  --node https://node3.gonka.ai/chain-rpc/ \
  --gas auto \
  --gas-adjustment 1.4 \
  --gas-prices 0.025ngonka \
  -y

Replace:

• <AMOUNT> — the exact amount in micro-USDT (e.g. 5000000 for 5 USDT)
• <YOUR_KEY_NAME_OR_ADDRESS> — your local key name or full gonka1... address

Note: you need a small amount of ngonka in your wallet to pay for gas fees.

Step 3: Verify the Deposit

After the transaction is confirmed, verify that the USDT balance in the community pool increased:

curl https://node3.gonka.ai/chain-api/cosmos/distribution/v1beta1/community_pool

Expected response — the IBC USDT amount should have increased by the amount you sent:

{
  "pool": [
    {
      "denom": "ibc/115F68FBA220A028C6F6ED08EA0C1A9C8C52798B14FB66E6C89D5D8C06A524D4",
      "amount": "<UPDATED_POOL_AMOUNT>.000000000000000000"
    },
    {
      "denom": "ngonka",
      "amount": "<CURRENT_NGONKA_POOL_AMOUNT>"
    }
  ]
}

Tip: run the same query before sending to note the starting pool balance, so you can confirm the increase.

Notes

• This guide reflects the process that worked at the time of writing. Always test with a small amount first and verify the transaction before sending the full amount.
• The fund-community-pool transaction is irreversible — once sent, the funds are in the community pool and can only be spent via a governance proposal.
• Do not send funds directly to the distribution module address (gonka1jv65s3grqf6v6jl3dp4t6c9t9rk99cd8h2rzwa) with a regular bank transfer — that will not credit the community pool. Always use fund-community-pool.
• If you do not have the inferenced binary, you can use any Cosmos-compatible wallet (e.g. Keplr with a custom chain configured for gonka-mainnet) to construct and sign the MsgFundCommunityPool transaction.