The rise of DEX

There was time – not long ago – when centralized exchanges (CEX) seemed like the only viable option for buying and selling crypto: decentralized alternatives were hard to use and struggling with liquidity.
However the speed of innovations in the crypto world is sensational and the new generation of DEX that appeared in the second half of 2020 has been smashing through every record ever since.

2021 has seen a tremendous growth of DEX (and all the DeFi sector), as they became user-friendly, fast and liquid. The DEX nowadays easily handle the exchanges between cryptoassets of the same blockchain or even different blockchains, and all this without any intrusion of a central authority. Unlike CEX that are full custodians of their client’s funds and are often inconvenienced by the ever-tightening regulations, DEX clients keep their private keys at all times and are the only custodians of their funds. Of course, DEX still cannot handle fiat transactions (and they probably never will), but the widespread use of stablecoins makes this issue secondary.

The figures prove the trend. A recent report by Messari, a crypto intelligence firm, showed that, despite the June’s decrease, DEX monthly volumes are still third-highest of all times. Moreover, DEX volumes as a percentage of CEX volumes surpassed 10%. As to the chains on which DEX operate, Ethereum is still the leader by far (>70%), followed by Binance Smart Chain (~20%) and the rising star – Ethereum second layer Polygon (~10%).