Leading decentralized exchange Uniswap has become the first decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol to generate more than $1 billion worth of platform fees for liquidity providers.
On Tuesday, Lucas Outumuro, head of research at crypto data aggregator IntoTheBlock, shared a chart on Twitter showing that the combined fee revenues of Uniswap’s v2 and v3 Ethereum mainnet deployments have surpassed $1 billion.
Including the fees generated by both Uniswap v1 and its v3 deployment on Optimism, Outumuro noted that roughly $1.02 billion has been distributed to Uniswap liquidity providers since the protocol’s creation in November 2018.
By contrast, IntoTheBlock’s data shows that the Bitcoin network has generated $2.24 billion in fees since its 2009 launch, while the DeFi-driven surge in activity on Ethereum has raised its total fee revenue to $4.74 billion in six years.
@Uniswap just became the first protocol to surpass $1B+ in fees
— Lucas Outumuro (@LucasOutumuro) August 10, 2021
Congrats to @haydenzadams and team pic.twitter.com/pnA10t41Yo
However, surging Ethereum-powered game Axie Infinity has emerged as the leading decentralized application (DApp) by fee revenue in recent weeks. According to Token Terminal, Axie has driven $308.5 million in platform fees over the past 30 days, equating to a daily average of nearly $10.3 million.
According to data from Dune Analytics, popular nonfungible token (NFT) marketplace OpenSea also appears to have overtaken Uniswap by fee revenue recently, with the platform generating $4.2 million in fees daily. According to CryptoFees, Uniswap represents $3.9 million in daily platform fees.
Related: Ethereum supply flips briefly into deflation as gas fees spike
With Ethereum’s recent London upgrades introducing a burn mechanism into the network’s fee market on Aug. 5, the surging popularity of Ethereum-based DApps has resulted in $100 million worth of Ether (ETH) being burned and more than 1,000 deflationary blocks being mined over the past week.
According to Ultrasound.Money, OpenSea currently ranks as the leading Ethereum DApp by burn rate after destroying 3,918 Ether (worth $12.5 million) since London went live.
Uniswap v2 ranks second with 2,344 Ether ($7.5 million), followed by Axie Infinity with 1,805 Ether (nearly $5.8 million), and Tether (USDT) with 1,555 Ether ($5 million).