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Shares of Uniswap Drop 16% Amid Concerns About Suit from the SEC
A Wells Notice was sent to Uniswap, a prominent decentralized exchange (DEX), by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
Coingecko statistics reveals that UNI has fallen 16.2% in the past 24 hours, with a current price of $9.37. In the previous week, the cryptocurrency has also lost 15% of its value.
The largest investors in Uniswap were alerted of impending action by the SEC. Three massive whales dumped 2.03 million UNI tokens—a whopping $20 million—from the Uniswap ecosystem in a matter of hours, according to on-chain data researchers at Lookonchain, who documented substantial market changes.
The wallets sold 1.25 million UNI altogether, which might be worth $3.5 million at the current market price. It is worth noting that these coins were transferred from Binance in March 2023, which might indicate a plan of retaining the exchange until regulatory concerns were resolved.
A different whale made a tidy $1.67 million after selling 472,000 UNI for a speedy $4.6 million USDC payoff. Not only did these three behemoths participate in the fire sale, but six more whale-sized wallets sent 316,400 UNI tokens to Binance, valuing them at almost $3.15 million.
In response to the SEC's action, Uniswap founder Hayden Adams moved quickly and aggressively. Adams accused the SEC of putting the interests of customers last in a scathing statement he published on the X platform, in which he blasted the agency's strategy and its emphasis on opaque, antiquated banking systems.
While highlighting the revolutionary potential of decentralized finance to expand access to financial services, he stressed the need of protecting Uniswap and the DeFi sector as a whole.
What may turn out to be a protracted and difficult legal struggle has begun with the Wells Notice. The enormous stakes were brought to light when Adams admitted that a war that may last years was possible.
What happens in this conflict, he said, may have far-reaching consequences for DeFi and the Bitcoin industry as a whole.
