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Uniswap Labs Officially Launches Layer-2 ‘Unichain’

Uniswap Labs, the primary developer behind one of the largest decentralized exchanges (DEX), Uniswap, shared Tuesday that its long-awaited layer-2 network, Unichain, is now live.
Powered by Optimism’s OP stack, Unichain—like other layer-2s on Ethereum—offers faster and cheaper transactions compared to Ethereum’s mainnet. Developers can deploy apps onto the network, which has been optimized specifically for decentralized finance (DeFi) and aims to serve as «the home for liquidity across chains,» according to Uniswap Labs.
For Uniswap Labs, the benefit of launching a layer-2 is twofold: it will provide a better experience for users of Uniswap and similar platforms, and it will create a new revenue opportunity in the form of network fees. A representative for Uniswap Labs told CoinDesk that «around 20%» of the chain’s revenue will go directly to the company.
Unichain has been in testing since October 2024 and is classified by Uniswap Labs as a «stage-1» rollup, meaning it has elements of decentralization but retains some centrally-controlled safeguards at this early phase.
The network is built on the OP Stack, a modular framework that lets developers build interoperable layer-2 chains based on Optimism’s optimistic rollup technology. Several well-known teams have come out with their own OP Stack-based layer-2’s, including Coinbase’s ‘Base’, Kraken’s ‘Ink,’ World’s ‘World chain,’ and Sony’s ‘Soneium.’
What makes Unichain different?
Dozens of layer-2 chains have popped up over the last few years, and Uniswap co-founder Hayden Adams believes that most of them will ultimately be used for specific use cases rather than serve as general-purpose blockchains. “We are anticipating a world of many, many different use cases, of which trading is a small subset,” Adams told CoinDesk in an interview.
In collaboration with Ethereum research and development firm Flashbots, the Uniswap team said it has created a Trusted Execution Environment (TEE) on Unichain. The TEE is a secure area for more sensitive transactions and is meant to optimize the chain for DeFi by allowing for more advanced trades and faster transaction finality.
“Essentially, we want Unichain to be a chain that is good for liquidity creation, good for trading, good for applications that need to be co-located with them, and then good for applications that essentially want access to liquidity but should not be co-located,” Adams said.
Building on Optimism
As part of its integration with Optimism’s «Superchain» ecosystem, Uniswap Labs has agreed to give 2.5% of Unichain’s gross revenue—or 15% of Unichain’s net revenue, whichever is greater—to the Optimism Collective, a consortium of people and companies that steward Optimism’s rollup tech. Many of the chains in the Optimism Superchain ecosystem have agreed to similar setups, including Coinbase and Kraken.
In exchange for building on Optimism, both Coinbase and Kraken received grants of Optimism’s OP governance tokens from the Optimism Foundation, which controls a treasury of tokens earmarked to help grow the ecosystem. Coinbase agreed to receive up to 118 million OP tokens, while Kraken agreed to 25 million. Uniswap Labs declined to comment on whether it had its own deal with the Optimism Foundation.
Ahead of Unichain’s mainnet launch, Uniswap Labs announced that 65% of the chain’s net revenue will go to the Unichain Validation Network—a group of validators and stakers securing the blockchain.
UVN will act as “another layer of transparency and validation of the network,” Adams said.
“Part of the uniqueness about us as a project that has always been decentralized first, is that we are actually reducing the role and the power of sequencer relative to other things that are running more centralized sequencers,” Adams added.
Read more: Uniswap Developer Unveils Own Layer-2 Network, Unichain, Built on Optimism Tech
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CoinDesk 20 Performance Update: Index Drops 2.5% as Nearly All Constituents Decline

CoinDesk Indices presents its daily market update, highlighting the performance of leaders and laggards in the CoinDesk 20 Index.
The CoinDesk 20 is currently trading at 4248.74, down 2.5% (-109.09) since 4 p.m. ET on Monday.
One of 20 assets is trading higher.
Leaders: AVAX (+0.6%) and BCH (-0.8%).
Laggards: UNI (-9.9%) and LINK (-7.0%).
The CoinDesk 20 is a broad-based index traded on multiple platforms in several regions globally.
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Pantera-Backed Solana Treasury Firm Helius Raises $500M, Stock Soars Over 200%

Helius Medical Technologies (HSDT) announced on Monday it’s raising more than $500 million in a private financing round to create a Solana-focused treasury company.
The vehicle will hold SOL, the native token of the Solana blockchain, as its reserve asset and aims to expand to more than $1.25 billion via stock warrants tied to the deal, the press release said.
The financing was led by Pantera Capital and Summer Capital, with participation from investors including Animoca Brands, FalconX and HashKey Capital.
Shares of the firm rallied over 200% above $24 in pre-market trading following the announcement. Solana was down 4% over the past 24 hours.
The firm is joining the latest wave of new digital asset treasuries, or DATs, with public companies pivoting to raise funds and buy cryptocurrencies like bitcoin (BTC), ether (ETH) or SOL.
Helius is set to rival with the recently launched Forward Industries (FORD) with a $1.65 billion war chest backed by Galaxy Digital and others. That firm confirmed on Monday that has already purchased 6.8 million tokens for roughly $1.58 billion last week.
Helius’ plan is to use Solana’s yield-bearing design to generate income on the holdings, earning staking rewards of around 7% as well as deploying tokens in decentralized finance (DeFi) and lending opportunities. Incoming executive chairman Joseph Chee, founder of Summer Capital and a former UBS banker, will lead the firm’s digital asset strategy alongside Pantera’s Cosmo Jiang and Dan Morehead.
«As a pioneer in the digital asset treasury space, having participated in the formation of the strategy at Twenty One Capital (CEP) with Tether, Softbank and Cantor, Bitmine (BMNR) with Tom Lee and Mozayyx as well as EightCo (OCTO) with Dan Ives and Sam Altman, we have built the expertise to set up the pre-eminent Solana treasury vehicle,» Cosmo Jiang, general partner at Pantera Capital, said in a statement.
«There is a real opportunity to drive the flywheel of creating shareholder value that Michael Saylor has pioneered with Strategy by accelerating Solana adoption,» he added.
Read more: Solana Surges as Galaxy Scoops Up Over $700M Tokens From Exchanges
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American Express Introduces Blockchain-Based ‘Travel Stamps’

American Express has introduced Ethereum-based ‘travel stamps’ to create a commemorative record of travel experiences, as part of the firm’s revamped travel app.
The travel experience tokens, which are technically NFTs (ERC 721 tokens), are minted and stored on Coinbase’s Base network, said Colin Marlowe , VP, Emerging Partnerships at Amex Digital Labs.
The travel stamps, which can be collected anytime a traveler uses their card, are not tradable NTF tokens, Marlowe explained, and neither do they function like blockchain-based loyalty points – at least for the time being.
“It’s a valueless ERC-721, so technically an NFT, but we just didn’t brand it as such. We wanted to speak to it in a way that was natural for the travel experience itself, and so we talk about these things as stamps, and they’re represented as tokens,” Marlowe said in an interview.
“As an identifier and representation of history the stamps could create interesting partnership angles over time. We weren’t trying to sell these or sort of generate any like short term revenue. The angle is to make a travel experience with Amex feel really rich, really different, and kind of set it apart,” he said.
The Amex travel app also includes a range of tools for travels and Centurion Lounge upgrades, the company said.
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