Uniswap

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Uniswap was created on November 2, 2018{{Cite web |last=Adams |first=Hayden |title=A short history of Uniswap |url=https://uniswap.org/blog/uniswap-history/ |website=Uniswap |date=11 February 2019 |language=en}} by Hayden Adams,{{Cite web |title=Hayden Adams |url=https://www.forbes.com/profile/hayden-adams/ |website=Forbes}} a former mechanical engineer at Siemens. Adams is the founder and CEO of Uniswap Labs, the company responsible for the development of the Uniswap Protocol, a decentralized exchange (DEX) built on the Ethereum blockchain.{{Cite web |title=Who is Hayden Adams? Founder of Uniswap |url=https://metaschool.so/articles/hayden-adams-founder-uniswap-profile-2#:~:text=Hayden%20Adams%20was%20born%20on,Bachelor%20in%20Engineering%20in%202016. |website=Metaschool| date=5 January 2023 }} Adams launched Uniswap in November 2018, after working as a mechanical engineer{{Cite web |title=Hayden Adams |url=https://golden.com/wiki/Hayden_Adams-4NRA5KE |website=Golden}} and being inspired by a blog post written by Vitalik Buterin, the co-founder of Ethereum.{{Cite web |last=Adams |first=Hayden |date=2019-11-05 |title=🦄 Uniswap Birthday Blog — V0 |url=https://medium.com/uniswap/uniswap-birthday-blog-v0-7a91f3f6a1ba |access-date=2025-05-14 |website=Uniswap |language=en}} His goal was to create a decentralized platform for exchanging tokens without relying on centralized exchanges.

Adams had no prior experience in blockchain technology or software development but taught himself through online resources. His innovative work on Uniswap has played a key role in the growth of decentralized finance (DeFi) by introducing the Automated Market Maker (AMM) model, which allows users to trade cryptocurrencies directly from their wallets.{{Cite news |title=A crypto-exchange founder makes his case for decentralised finance |url=https://www.economist.com/by-invitation/2022/12/06/a-crypto-exchange-founder-makes-his-case-for-decentralised-finance |access-date=2024-12-13 |newspaper=The Economist |issn=0013-0613}}

Uniswap’s average daily trading volume was US$220 million in October 2020. Traders and investors have utilized Uniswap because of its usage in decentralized finance (DeFi).

Uniswap Labs is a software company in the decentralized finance (DeFi) space, founded in 2018 by Hayden Adams. The company's early investors included venture capital firms like Andreessen Horowitz, Paradigm Operations,{{Cite web |last=Gara |first=Antoine |title=From Wall Street's Greatest Trade To The Top Dealmakers And Financial Entrepreneurs: 30 Under 30 In Finance 2021 |url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/antoinegara/2020/12/01/from-wall-streets-greatest-trade-to-the-top-dealmakers-and-financial-entrepreneurs-30-under-30-in-finance-2021/?sh=3962d9013b10 |website=Forbes |language=en}}{{Cite web |last=del Castillo |first=Michael |title=11 Bitcoin And Blockchain Leaders Made Forbes 30 Under 30 List |url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeldelcastillo/2020/12/01/10-bitcoin-and-blockchain-leaders-who-made-forbes-30-under-30-list/?sh=75e45a942198 |website=Forbes |language=en}} Union Square Ventures LLC and ParaFi.{{Cite web |date=29 September 2020 |title=Novogratz Plows Ahead In DeFi Amid the 'Gamifying' of Crypto |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-09-29/novogratz-plows-ahead-in-defi-amid-the-gamifying-of-crypto |website=Bloomberg.com |language=en}}

In 2022 Uniswap Labs had raised $165 million, after announcing in 2021 that it was looking to raise between $100 and $200 million and was working with Polychain.{{Cite web |last=Singh |first=Manish |date=2022-10-13 |title=Uniswap Labs valued at $1.66 billion in $165 million new funding |url=https://techcrunch.com/2022/10/13/uniswap-labs-raises-165-million-in-new-funding/ |access-date=2024-12-13 |website=TechCrunch |language=en-US}}

Uniswap offers products such as a self-custodial mobile wallet, a Trading API for professional users, and a web interface. These tools provide access to liquidity across multiple blockchains, including Ethereum, Polygon, and Optimism. The company has also collaborated with traditional finance platforms like [https://www.fireblocks.com/ Fireblocks] to integrate DeFi features into traditional financial systems, thereby expanding its reach to institutional clients.{{Cite press release |title=Uniswap Labs and Fireblocks Collaborate to Bring DeFi Innovation to TradFi |url=https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20241204889966/en/Uniswap-Labs-and-Fireblocks-Collaborate-to-Bring-DeFi-Innovation-to-TradFi |website=Business Wire}}

The Uniswap Foundation was founded in 2022 by Devin Walsh and Ken Ng, after 95% of Uniswap token holders voted in favor of the proposal.{{Cite web |title=S2:E8 Uniswap Foundation: Behind the Scenes with Devin Walsh |url=https://www.archetype.fund/media/s2-e8-uniswap-foundation-behind-the-scenes-with-devin-walsh |access-date=2025-05-14 |website=www.archetype.fund |language=en}} The Foundation's mission is to support the decentralized growth and sustainability of the Uniswap Protocol and its supporting ecosystem and community.{{Cite web |date=2022-08-04 |title=[Temperature Check] Create the Uniswap Foundation |url=https://gov.uniswap.org/t/temperature-check-create-the-uniswap-foundation/17358 |access-date=2025-05-14 |website=Uniswap Governance |language=en}} It facilitates community governance of the Uniswap DAO, development of the Uniswap Protocol, and communication among contributors.{{Cite web |last=Adejumo |first=Oluwapelumi |date=2025-04-02 |title=Compound looks to emulate Uniswap with new foundation initiative |url=https://cryptoslate.com/compound-looks-to-emulate-uniswap-with-new-foundation-initiative/ |access-date=2025-05-14 |website=CryptoSlate |language=en-US}} Uniswap Foundation's most recent vision and funding proposal—Uniswap Unleashed—outlined a plan to make the Uniswap Protocol the world’s infrastructure for digital value transfer with significant support for Uniswap v4 and Unichain.{{Cite web |date=2025-02-14 |title=[Governance Proposal] Uniswap Unleashed: Unichain and Uniswap v4 Liquidity Incentives |url=https://gov.uniswap.org/t/governance-proposal-uniswap-unleashed-unichain-and-uniswap-v4-liquidity-incentives/25250 |access-date=2025-05-14 |website=Uniswap Governance |language=en}} It passed with overwhelming support.{{Cite web |last=Hitchcock |first=Decrypt / Logan |date=2025-03-20 |title=Uniswap Foundation Gets $177 Million in Funding as Ethereum DeFi Users Await Fee Sharing |url=https://decrypt.co/310912/uniswap-177-million-funding-fee-sharing |access-date=2025-05-14 |website=Decrypt |language=en-US}}

Uniswap is a decentralized finance protocol that is used to exchange cryptocurrencies and tokens; it is provided on blockchain networks that run open-source software.{{Cite web |date=11 September 2020 |title=Crypto Exchange Gets Millions After Copy-Paste of a Rival's Code |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-09-11/-come-to-jesus-moment-for-crypto-finance-apps-rocks-valuations |website=Bloomberg.com |language=en}} This is in contrast to cryptocurrency exchanges that are run by centralized companies.

Changes to the protocol are voted on by the owners of a native cryptocurrency and governance token called UNI, and then implemented by a team of developers. Uniswap launched without the UNI token, and the token is not needed to trade on the exchange. Tokens were initially distributed to early users of the protocol.{{Cite web |author=Crypto Confidential |title=Stimulus Checks From A Crypto Exchange; Bitcoin Rebound |url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/cryptoconfidential/2020/09/20/stimulus-checks-from-a-crypto-exchange-bitcoin-rebound/?sh=2f66301178d5 |website=Forbes |language=en}}

File:Uniswap Foundation Logo.png logo]]

File:Constant product formula.png{{Cite web |title=How Uniswap works |url=https://docs.uniswap.org/contracts/v2/concepts/protocol-overview/how-uniswap-works |website=Uniswap Docs}}|184x184px]]

Uniswap acts as an automated market maker and uses liquidity pools to fulfill orders, instead of relying on a traditional market maker, with an aim to create more efficient markets.{{Cite journal |last1=Lo |first1=Yuen |last2=Medda |first2=Francesca |date=3 November 2020 |title=Uniswap and the rise of the decentralized exchange |url=https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/103925/ |journal=Mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de |language=en}}{{Cite web |last=Konrad |first=Alex |title=These Young Investors Are Still Betting Big On Crypto — And Are Taking Harvard And Stanford Along For The Ride |url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexkonrad/2020/10/18/these-young-investors-betting-big-on-crypto-are-taking-harvard-and-stanford-along-for-the-ride/?sh=5e9280d4212d |website=Forbes |language=en}} Individuals and bots—termed "liquidity providers"—provide liquidity to the exchange by adding a pair of tokens to a smart contract which can be bought and sold by other users according to the constant-product rule $\backslash phi(x,\; y)\; =\; xy$.{{cite journal |last1=Adams |first1=Hayden |last2=Zinsmeister |first2=Noah |title=Uniswap v3 core |journal=Uniswap |date=March 2021 |url=https://uniswap.org/whitepaper-v3.pdf}} In return, liquidity providers are given a percentage of the trading fees earned for that trading pair. For each trade, a certain amount of tokens is removed from the pool for an amount of the other token, thereby changing the price. No fees are required to list tokens which allow a large amount of Ethereum tokens to be accessible and no registration is required for users. As open-source software, Uniswap's code can also be forked to create new exchanges.{{Cite web |last=Osborne |first=Charlie |title=DeFi SushiSwap creator returns $14m in ETH to project after causing token crash |url=https://www.zdnet.com/article/defi-sushiswap-creator-returns-14m-in-eth-after-causing-coin-crash/ |website=ZDNet |language=en}}

File:UNI 4 Year Release Schedule.png{{Cite web |title=Introducing UNI |url=https://blog.uniswap.org/uni |website=Uniswap Labs Blog |at=Community Treasury}}]]

UNI is the governance token of the Uniswap protocol, enabling holders to participate in the platform's decentralized governance. Introduced in September 2020, UNI was distributed through an airdrop to early users of the platform and allocated to various stakeholders, including the development team, investors, and a community treasury.

The token allows holders to propose and vote on protocol upgrades, changes to fee structures, and other governance-related matters. UNI operates on the Ethereum blockchain following the ERC-20 standard, ensuring compatibility with a wide range of decentralized applications. Its total supply is capped, with a scheduled release over several years to support ongoing development and ecosystem growth.{{Cite web |title=Introducing UNI |url=https://blog.uniswap.org/uni |website=Uniswap Labs Blog}}File:Initial Uniswap token allocation.png

• Uniswap Labs
• Liquidity Pool
• Ethereum
• DeFi
• Cryptocurrency
• PancakeSwap
• List of bitcoin companies

• [https://app.uniswap.org/ Uniswap Protocol]

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Category:Decentralized cryptocurrency exchanges

Category:Ethereum-based protocols

Category:Ethereum tokens

Category:Decentralized autonomous organizations