DeFi & L1L2 Weekly (18/10/2023)

Uniswap to charge a 0.15% swap fee on select assets; Uniswap V4’s hooks feature proposes KYC on pools. Ethereum L2 Scroll launches on mainnet. Platypus loses over $2M from flash loan attack, its third exploit in 2023.

Weekly DeFi Index

This week’s market cap index was positive at +0.04%, while volume and volatility indices were negative at -5.01% and -22.02%, respectively.

Chart of the Week

In a recent blog post, Uniswap Labs announced that it will impose a 0.15% flat fee on trades involving ETH, USDC, and other select tokens executed through Uniswap Labs’ frontends. It states that the fee only applies when traded through Uniswap Labs’ interfaces on the mainnet and supported Layer-2s for specified tokens (swaps between stablecoins are exempt).

This fee is different from Uniswap’s existing ‘protocol fee’ that governance voters manage, which is being levied by Uniswap Labs to fund its operations sustainably.

News Highlights

• A new ‘hook’ available on Uniswap V4 allows users to be checked for Know Your Customer (KYC) before they can trade on a pool. It was rolled out by a community developer in Uniswap V4’s directory as an opt-in functionality and will permit developers to use KYC verification within the protocol.
• Scroll, an Ethereum Layer-2 zkEVM solution, confirmed the launch of its mainnet on 17 October. Existing applications and developer toolkits on Ethereum can now migrate to the new scaling solution.
• Optimism-based decentralised social media protocol Farcaster launched permissionless onboarding, allowing anyone with an internet connection and Ether to sign up and use the network. 
• USDR stablecoin issuer Tangible is planning a recovery after the stablecoin’s value plummeted from its US$1 peg. To make users whole, Tangible said it would liquidate its assets, including real estate, and offer a mix of cryptocurrency assets for redemption. However, the value of the redemption process is uncertain and could take months to complete.
• DeFi protocol Platypus suffered another flash loan exploit, losing over $2.3 million in assets. The exploit was carried out in three separate attacks, and the protocol suspended its pools as a response. This is the third attack on Platypus in 2023, with the previous attacks resulting in losses of $8.5 million and $157,000, respectively. 
• Stablecoin issuer TrueUSD experienced a third-party security breach that resulted in the exposure of personally identifiable information of some of its clients. The breach, which involved TrueUSD’s former service provider TrueCoin, revealed names, email addresses, phone numbers, blockchain addresses and other data. TrueCoin claimed the breach was directed towards a third-party vendor it no longer uses, but reached out to relevant users for information purposes and to ensure no operational breach occurred for TrueUSD. 
• The Fantom Foundation, the organisation behind the Fantom blockchain, has been hit by a malicious attack on a number of its crypto wallets, with a total of $657,000 stolen, reportedly through a zero-day exploit on Chrome. The stolen funds have been transferred to a wallet that holds around $7 million worth of ETH, and the community is actively tracking the movements of the lost funds.

Recent Research Reports

• Research Roundup Newsletter [September 2023]: We present to you our latest issue of Research Roundup, featuring trending market insights in September, charts of the month, and our insights on the Ethereum Dencun upgrade.
• Ethereum: Dencun Upgrade and Proto-Danksharding: Ethereum’s next major upgrade is Dencun, which introduces Proto-Danksharding. We explore what it is and its benefits.
• Alpha Navigator: Quest for Alpha [September 2023]: Risk assets end 3Q 2023 mostly down on a QoQ basis, but YTD paints a more positive picture. Inflation retreats. The US avoids a government shutdown.

Recent University Articles

• What Is Impermanent Loss? How to Manage It in DeFi Liquidity Pools: Learn about Impermanent Loss, a crucial concept in DeFi liquidity pools, and how to navigate and leverage it.
• What Is Ethereum Gas?: In the world of blockchain, every transaction comes with a cost, known as a ‘gas fee’. Here, we explain the importance of gas for the network and how to calculate its cost.
• What Is Avalanche (AVAX)?: Dive into Avalanche’s AVAX token and learn about its consensus mechanism, tokenomics, and how it compares to other Layer-1 protocols.

We’re all ears.

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