DeFi aggregator 1inch stages new ‘vampire airdrop’ to Uniswap users

The 1inch.exchange protocol, a platform that aggregates decentralized exchanges and provides its own automated market maker, is airdropping a new stash of its 1INCH tokens.

The airdrop follows the initial generation of the new tokens on Christmas, which were distributed to past users of the aggregator. A common point of contention for the initial airdrop was the exclusion of Mooniswap users and liquidity providers, as the project's AMM platform was superseded by an integrated 1inch Liquidity Protocol.

The new airdrop, which was already delivered at 5 PM UTC, retroactively distributes tokens to anyone who interacted with Mooniswap before Dec. 24. About 4.8 million tokens will be distributed to 9,094 users of Mooniswap. This amounts to 527 1INCH worth about $3,000. Another 3.57 million tokens were given to 1,308 participants of an earlier liquidity mining program in November. Finally, 310,000 tokens were delivered to limit order users and another 375,000 to users of smart contract wallets like Argent, Authereum, Gnosis and Pillar — as long they would have been eligible for the initial airdrop if they used normal wallets.

Lastly, the project distributed 6 million 1INCH tokens to particularly active Uniswap traders. To receive the airdrop, the traders must have interacted with Uniswap in at least 20 separate days, and have done at least three trades in 2021. In addition, the wallets must not have interacted with either 1inch or Mooniswap in the past.

According to a 1inch spokesperson, there are about 25,000 such addresses, entitling each to 240 tokens or $1,350 at current prices. The airdrop looks to entice active Uniswap traders to try 1inch, the spokesperson said. To claim the airdrop, these users must connect their wallet to the protocol, which should familiarize them with the interface.

Airdrops to users of other protocols are not a new concept. BadgerDAO’s airdrop, for example, gave tokens to power users of DeFi — governance participants in various protocols, as well as minters and users of various Bitcoin (BTC) wrappers on Ethereum.

Usually, these airdrops were meant to properly seed initial token supplies, so that only active participants in DeFi would receive them. The airdrop conducted by 1inch now has one specific purpose: Stealing some users from Uniswap.

Uniswap is no stranger to other protocols trying to undermine it. SushiSwap was born as an attempt to steal Uniswap liquidity, since its yield farming program specifically required using Uniswap pool tokens. The idea was that Uniswap liquidity providers would be automatically migrated to SushiSwap, though in the end most of the capital farming SUSHI was brought by outsiders, and the “vampire attack” ended up arguably strengthening Uniswap.

It is generally believed that the UNI airdrop, which popularized the concept of rewarding past users for basic actions, was a response to SushiSwap’s unsuccessful attack. In an ironic twist of fate, Uniswap’s airdrop playbook is now being used against it by another competitor.