Uniswap fee reward mechanism proposal boosts its earnings above Bitcoin

Uniswap has outpaced Bitcoin in fees paid by crypto traders for over a week, with the DEX surpassing Bitcoin on Feb. 14

According to data from Cryptofees, Uniswap raked in around $1.9 million in fees on Feb. 25, surpassing Bitcoin’s $1.2 million on the same day. This trend has persisted since mid-month, with Uniswap pulling in an average of $2.1 million in fees over the last week, compared to BTC’s $1.4 million.

Meanwhile, Ethereum is the overall leader in terms of transaction fees. The blockchain network generated $10.6 million in fees during the past day and an average of $13 million per day over the past week. Notably, Bitcoin held this enviable position early in the year and some periods last year as community interest in Ordinals Inscriptions propelled its network fees higher.

Uniswap fees

Uniswap’s lucrative fees have come during an interesting time, with the DEX Foundation recently proposing a fee reward mechanism for its UNI token holders.

As the largest DeFi DEX platform, Uniswap handles roughly 30% of total trades in the decentralized finance sector, according to DeFillama data. Notably, all fees generated by Uniswap belong to liquidity providers (LPs) who supply assets to the platform. These fees accrue when users conduct asset swaps on the exchange, indicating heightened activity within the decentralized ecosystem.

However, with the new proposal, the DEX will allocate protocol fees among staked and delegated UNI token holders to revitalize governance participation. Erin Koen, Uniswap Foundation’s governance lead, highlighted the potential of this move to bolster the protocol’s resilience and decentralization.

The Foundation’s executive director, Devin Walsh, further emphasized how the upgrade will fortify Uniswap’s governance. Walsh added:

“If every company building on Uniswap disappeared tomorrow, it would be up to its delegates to leverage their powers to ensure the Uniswap Protocol + ecosystem continue to survive and thrive into the future. In that way, incentivizing active, engaged delegation is integral to long term protocol sustainability.”

The proposal still awaits preliminary and final on-chain votes before implementation.

In response to these developments, the UNI token has seen a notable uptick, surging approximately 40% over the past week to $10.59, based on CryptoSlate’s data.