Key Highlights
- Genie, an NFT marketplace aggregator, was purchased by Uniswap for an undisclosed sum.
- For the Genie protocol's early adopters, a USDC token airdrop is announced.
- Opinion on the move from a renowned EIP editor from the Ethereum community- Micah Zoltu.
TL;DR
Acquisition highlights
Uniswap is the biggest decentralized exchange (DEX) running on the Ethereum blockchain. It enables users to exchange cryptocurrency directly between themselves from anywhere in the world. Users can vote on significant protocol updates using their governance token called UNI. They recently expanded their horizons by adding NFTs as a product and purchased Genie, the first NFT marketplace aggregator. You can find NFTs to purchase and sell on all the various marketplaces by using an aggregator.
1/ The Uniswap Universe is expanding 🦄
— Uniswap Labs 🦄 (@Uniswap) June 21, 2022
In pursuit of our mission to unlock universal ownership and exchange, we’re excited to share that we’ve acquired @geniexyz — the first NFT marketplace aggregator — expanding our products to include both ERC-20s and NFTs 🧞♂️ pic.twitter.com/vESlbE3kvy
The Uniswap protocol's creator, Hayden Adams, stated that the move's primary motivation is their belief in universal ownership and exchange, and the fact that NFTs are a significant component of digital ownership led them to decide to expand their product line to include both ERC-20s and NFTs.
The Uniswap web app, which also happens to be the asset with the most traffic, will have a component for buying and selling NFTs. Now, you may purchase or sell NFTs directly from their website that are featured on all of the marketplaces. To make Uniswap a complete web3 platform for users and builders, their next step would be to incorporate NFTs into their developer APIs and widgets.
Since both the ERC 20 and NFT ecosystems are crucial to the development of the digital economy and serve as a key entry point to web 3, they really don't see any point in making these two as separate ecosystems. Instead, they are foreseeing NFTs and ERC20s collaboratively evolving in the future.
Actually, this isn't their first time working with NFTs; in the spring of 2019, they introduced Unisocks, their own NFT collection and the industry's first example of NFT liquidity pools and NFTs backed by physical assets.
Airdrop announcement
The airdrop of USDC tokens to historical Genie protocol users has been announced by Uniswap. Based on a snapshot that has already been taken, the airdrop will begin in August and will be redeemable for up to 12 months by the eligible wallets.
The airdrop is open to anybody who used the Genie protocol by April 15th and made more than one swap, as well as anyone who had the Genie Genesis NFT by that date.
Community response
Considering the recent significant declines in the cryptocurrency market, purchasing an NFT marketplace aggregator might not seem like the wisest course of action. As a result, we have received a variety of responses from the users of the protocol.
One of them originated from Micah Zoltu, a well-known Ethereum community EIP editor. You can read the tweet thread below to see how he expressed his concerns about Uniswap entering the centralised finance sector and his displeasure with the move.
I'm pretty unhappy about this, at least at first glance. When I use the Uniswap UI, especially via IPFS, I expect that any transaction prompt will be 100% permissionless/trustless. Looked at Genie contracts, it is CeFi, not DeFi. Why is @Uniswap getting into the CeFi game? https://t.co/hKY5azpFZR
— Micah Zoltu (@MicahZoltu) June 22, 2022
The issues described by @MicahZoltu are serious. I have hope that Uniswap Labs are aware of the current issues with Genie contracts and will fix them. @Uniswap https://t.co/sp0aTVwaIX
— Hudson Jameson (@hudsonjameson) June 22, 2022
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