DeFi

Uniswap v4's most interesting development isn't it's features, it's how it's turning Uniswap's competitors into its customers.

Breaking down defi's next major platform play 👇

Head of Product Serotonin | DΞF

serotonin.co/platform

## What Uniswap released

Uniswap's v4 contracts introduce a few new primitives and bring back a familiar face or two. Here are the four you need to know about:

1. Singleton contract model instead of factory/pool
This approach makes new pool creation cheaper, allowing Uniswap to scale faster and more broadly. Given there are now more coins than there are bitcoin, seems like a good future proofing move. This singleton model also reduces the costs for frequent traders/LPs by allowing tokens to stay within the singleton.

2. Flash accounting
Flash accounting allows people to borrow tokens and return them within the same transaction. Once the domain of MEV bots, this allows things like sending an ETH token without any ETH in your wallet. Think lower costs for complex multi-step transactions.

3. Reintroducing native ETH support
Eliminates the need for wrapping/unwrapping ETH as an extra step. Pretty straightforward, fewer steps = lower costs.

4. Hooks
By far the most transformative, this feature allows customizable code to run before or after pool actions, enabling everything from dynamic fee structures to custom curves to advanced trade execution features like limit and TWAP orders (time weighted average price). More importantly, this gives AMM builders a prebaked toolkit they can use to build new, more experimental or purpose-built AMMs. Critically, any AMMs that use these tools will use Uniswap as an execution environment. Any AMMs built with Uniswap's tools will have Uniswap's scale, liquidity, and assets available on day one.

How v4 reshapes defi

Now the fun part, why this matters. Between the singleton architecture, flash accounting, and hooks, Uniswap has created something that fundamentally changes defi's competitive landscape.

To understand why, consider how defi has traditionally been structured. The ecosystem has operated in three layers:

1.  L1 (settlement/security)
2.  AMM/DEX (trading)
3.  Defi applications

What makes v4 significant is how it splits that middle layer in two, creating a new stack with them at the center:

1.  L1 (settlement/security)
2.  AMM infrastructure (hooks, flash accounting, pools)
3.  Specialized trading (novel/targeted hook implementations)
4.  Defi applications

This isn't just an architectural detail, it's a major shift to how protocols will launch, compete, and evolve. Instead of every new AMM needing to bootstrap their own infra and liquidity, they can focus on whatever new concepts make them unique and know that they'll have a massive pool of liquidity to tap into on day one.

For teams building new or specialized AMMs the choice is clear: rebuild everything from scratch or get a massive head start. Some will still DIY it, but this will be the defi equivalent of setting up sever racks in a closet.

This pattern should feel familiar — it's exactly what Amazon did with AWS. They took web infrastructure that every web retailer was building, broke it down into components like compute and storage, and rebundled them into managed services to sell to their once competitors. Uniswap is doing the same with defi primitives.

The result? Uniswap moves from competing directly with other AMMs to becoming the infrastructure that they build upon. This not only weakens their competitor's strategic position by making it super easy for new AMMs to have massive scale, but it having huge new entrants using their tech cements Uniswap's position for years to come. Rather than fighting vamprie attacks and liquidity wars, Uniswap gets to benefit from every innovation in the space.

Well done Uniswap crew, excited to see where this one goes.

✌️

## Why this matters

For markets:
The combination of singleton and architecture and flash accounting could unlock new pool types that were previously too expensive or too complex to run

For established institutions:
Institutions, particularly market makers will likely lean into hooks especially hard in search of the new MEV capture opportunities they enable.

For retail:
Lower gas costs, higher liquidity, and better execution from the new features institutions will bring.

For new developers:
More freedom than ever before to bootstrap novel AMM structures — all on top of Uniswap's network.

AKA joe, shadowy super svgs, design at Dune

Maybe, although that would depend on what uni wants to do with their amm. More importantly, these changes allow anyone to build a new amm with whatever fee parameters they want while taking advantage of uniswap’s liquidity

Does this mean instead of separate pools for separate fee tiers, LPs will be able to customize their own ranges via hooks in a single pool? 
(Pls correct any ignorant terms or mental models)