Hot Tokens Learning Week 23: UNI Narrative Shifts to Real Token Burns; Circle’s Arc to Launch Mainnet on September 16

Summary

1. Uniswap’s mechanism has shifted from “narrative” to real token burns, with Robinhood Chain + tokenized assets currently representing the biggest catalysts.

2. Community discussion around Circle is highly focused on two issues: Arc’s mainnet launch on September 16, and whether Circle can successfully shift from “earning interest” to “operating a settlement network.”

3. ENA tokenomics have undergone a major overhaul, with the Ethena Foundation announcing four adjustments at once.

4. The community recognizes Solana’s position as a primary venue for trading and tokenized assets; however, the token itself remains constrained by the same long-standing issue: the chain is busy, but value accrual to SOL remains limited.

5. The community believes MRVL’s earnings were strong, but not “explosive” enough. After the quarterly report on August 27, the stock fell sharply by about 6%–10%, exposing the divide between bulls and bears.

UNI

Project Introduction

Uniswap is currently one of the world’s leading decentralized exchange (DEX) protocols. Uniswap was created by Hayden Adams in 2018, inspired by Vitalik Buterin’s ideas around on-chain automated market making. It runs on Ethereum and multiple EVM-compatible chains, allowing users to swap tokens directly from their wallets without registration, asset custody, or KYC.

Market Updates

Protocol Fee Switch + UNI Burn Mechanism

The UNIfication proposal passed at the end of 2025 activated the protocol fee switch, directing a portion of protocol fees into a mechanism that permanently burns UNI. It also burned 100 million UNI from the treasury in a one-time action.

On August 21, Uniswap set a single-day burn record of approximately 150,000 UNI, worth about $590,000.

On August 28, Hayden Adams posted that the 30-day annualized burn had exceeded $100 million for the first time, while the 7-day annualized burn reached $150 million, both all-time highs.

As of the end of August, cumulative burns had reached approximately 110 million UNI, with a total value of about $630 million. The annualized burn rate has increased significantly, and UNI is shifting from a pure governance token toward a deflationary asset linked to actual protocol usage. Robinhood Chain has become a major contributor to UNI burns.

Other updates include the DualPool Hook, which allows market makers to earn lending yields on idle inventory; the Pools.trade launchpad, a token issuance platform on Robinhood Chain; and the Earn feature, developed in partnership with Morpho, which allows users to earn yields on USDC/USDT/ETH within the Uniswap app. The protocol fee switch for some v4 pools was activated in late July, further increasing the scale of burns.

New Developments in Uniswap v4

Permissioned Pools: a new Hook standard for v4 that has gone live on the Ethereum mainnet. It allows tokenized funds and regulated assets to trade in AMMs while enforcing issuer-level compliance rules, such as KYC, at the smart contract level. Partners include Superstate, Securitize, Dowgo, and others.

Other updates include the DualPool Hook, which allows market makers to earn lending yields on idle inventory; the Pools.trade launchpad, a token issuance platform on Robinhood Chain; and the Earn feature, developed in partnership with Morpho, which allows users to earn yields on USDC/USDT/ETH within the Uniswap app.

The protocol fee switch for some v4 pools was activated in late July, further increasing the scale of burns.

Community Views

Uniswap’s mechanism has shifted from “narrative” to real token burns, with Robinhood Chain + tokenized assets currently representing the biggest catalysts. Bulls view this as a qualitative change, while bears and those on the sidelines believe the burn volume and the risks associated with dependence on a single chain have not yet been fully priced in. Short-term traders are watching support and resistance around $5, while longer-term investors are more focused on whether the burn rate and RWA trading volume can continue to expand.

CRCL (Circle)

Project Introduction

Circle Internet Group, Inc., commonly known as Circle, is a U.S. fintech company headquartered in New York. It was founded in 2013 by Jeremy Allaire, its current CEO and chairman, and Sean Neville. The company is committed to turning fiat currencies such as the U.S. dollar into programmable, internet-native money that can circulate around the clock, while building an open internet financial system. On June 5, 2025, Circle listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker CRCL, becoming a representative public company in the stablecoin sector.

Market Updates

Arc Public Chain Mainnet Launch Approaching

Arc is Circle’s self-developed Layer-1 blockchain, positioned as an “operating system for the internet economy.” It uses USDC as its gas and settlement currency and emphasizes low latency, compliance, and institutional-grade applications. The public mainnet is scheduled to launch on September 16. Its founding validator lineup is notable, including traditional finance and payments giants such as BlackRock, DTCC, Visa, Mastercard, ICE, Galaxy, Standard Chartered, MoneyGram, and SBI. The testnet has already processed more than 500 million transactions across nearly 3 million wallets, while the private mainnet has more than 100 partners. BlackRock plans to deploy its tokenized fund BUIDL on Arc. The market views Arc as a key test of whether Circle can move beyond reliance on reserve interest and achieve a platform-based valuation.

Regulatory and “Banking” Developments

In July, Circle obtained a U.S. OCC national trust bank charter through Circle National Trust, which has begun operations and can provide services such as digital asset custody. During the same period, it also received a New York State trust charter. These developments further position Circle alongside traditional financial institutions and strengthen institutional trust.

Brand and Ecosystem Expansion

August 28: Circle reached a principal sponsorship agreement with Chelsea Football Club. The USDC brand will appear on the jerseys of the men’s team, women’s team, and academy teams, marking the first stablecoin brand exposure in the Premier League.

USDC supply has increased noticeably recently, with roughly several billion tokens issued over one week. The market interprets this as a recovery in demand, potentially related to institutional subscriptions or ecosystem groundwork.

Product updates include CCTP V2 migration, support for new chains such as Plasma, Circle Mint support for more fiat on- and off-ramps, EURC circulation exceeding €400 million, cirBTC, and more.

Community Views

Community discussion around Circle is highly focused on two issues: Arc’s mainnet launch on September 16, and whether Circle can successfully shift from “earning interest” to “operating a settlement network.” The broad community consensus is that the long-term narrative of compliant stablecoins + a proprietary settlement network + institutional backing is recognized, while the short-term focus is whether Arc’s mainnet can deliver quantifiable data and revenue on September 16. Bulls view the area around $87 as an accumulation window, while bears and those on the sidelines believe the interest-rate environment and competitive pressure have not yet been fully digested, and are waiting for execution results.

ENA (Ethena)

Project Introduction

Ethena is a crypto-native synthetic dollar protocol founded by Guy Young. It launched its core product, USDe, in 2024. Rather than placing dollars in bank accounts, Ethena uses crypto assets and derivatives hedging to maintain its peg to the U.S. dollar and distributes yield to holders. The team refers to the staked version as the “Internet Bond.”

Market Updates

Major ENA Tokenomics Overhaul

The Ethena Foundation announced four adjustments at once:

1) Buying back locked tokens from early investors who had sold: For seed-round investors who sold over the past nine months and whose original allocation exceeded 0.25% of the total supply, the foundation will purchase their remaining locked ENA through OTC transactions.

2) Ending monthly VC unlocks: The remaining tokens held by original investors will be released in a one-time unlock on October 5, rather than continuing to unlock monthly. Team tokens remain locked according to the original schedule. After the adjustment, approximately 12% of the supply will remain locked, including team, ecosystem, and foundation allocations.

3) Protocol value accrues to the foundation: The arrangement clarifies that the economic interests of the ecosystem belong to the foundation and are separate from Labs equity.

4) Fee switch proposal: Voting is ongoing until around September 2. The core of the proposal is that once USDe's circulating supply reaches $7.5 billion, 95% of the net revenue from Ethena’s three branded business lines will be used for programmatic ENA buybacks, while 5% will be reserved for growth. The buyback ratio will then be increased further at milestones such as $10 billion, $15 billion, and $20 billion. The three business lines include USDe savings, white-label stablecoins, and the upcoming Ethena X.

Community Views

Community discussion is almost entirely centered on one question: whether this is a real value transfer to tokenholders or simply another buyback narrative that has yet to materialize. Short-term sentiment leans bullish, but many remain cautious. The broad community consensus is as follows: the direction of “reducing sell pressure + tying revenue to ENA” is recognized; however, the bearish view on execution is specific — if USDe does not return to $7.5 billion, the buyback remains only a narrative. Bulls are betting on the flywheel restarting, while those on the sidelines are waiting for the September 2 voting result, the October 5 unlock, and whether stock perpetuals can truly bring new scale.

SOL

Project Introduction

Solana is a high-performance Layer 1 public blockchain that aims to serve as internet-scale capital markets and payments infrastructure, offering high throughput, low fees, and near-real-time finality. It was founded by Anatoly Yakovenko, Raj Gokal, and others, and its mainnet launched in March 2020.

Market Updates

Solana Network Upgrade Calendar

Agave 4.2: Rolled out in August, reducing block times from approximately 400ms to around 350ms and significantly lowering account rent costs.

Alpenglow: A major consensus overhaul targeting final confirmation within 100–150 milliseconds. The code is close to completion, and the mainnet activation window is broadly expected to fall in September–October, alongside version 4.3.

Firedancer: The independent client continues to increase adoption, improving client diversity.

Upcoming areas of focus include rent and transaction format adjustments around September 9, as well as progress on Alpenglow in October.

First Network-Wide On-chain Governance Vote

All three SOL proposals reached quorum, with two passing and one failing:

SGP-0001 Constitution: Passed with approximately 86% support, establishing a formal governance framework.

SGP-0002 Doubling Deflation: Passed with approximately 67% support, just above the two-thirds threshold. The annual deflation rate will increase from 15% to 30%, while terminal inflation remains at 1.5%. The lower bound is expected to be reached around 2029, earlier than the previous estimate of around 2032, reducing issuance by approximately 18.9 million SOL over six years. This is only governance authorization and will not actually change issuance until the SIMD-0550 technical implementation is completed.

SGP-0003 Charging by Compute Resources and Significantly Increasing Burns: Failed with approximately 54% support. The original plan was to increase daily burns from around 650 SOL to 7,500–9,000 SOL, or roughly 14x, but it did not secure a supermajority.

Community Views

In August, community sentiment quickly shifted from “10 consecutive months of decline, usage rising but price not following” to a more bullish stance. The core debate is whether this is a structural repricing or a leveraged rebound. The broad community consensus is that Solana’s position as a primary venue for trading and tokenized assets is recognized; however, the token itself remains constrained by the same long-standing issue: the chain is busy, but SOL captures relatively little value. In August, bulls gained ground on “ETF + reclaiming 100 + deflation passed,” while bears and those on the sidelines pointed to “burns failed, governance was close, and the rally has already been substantial.” The community is watching whether Alpenglow can go live on mainnet on schedule, when the deflation proposal will actually change issuance, and whether $100 can hold.

MRVL

Project Introduction

MRVL is the ticker symbol of Nasdaq-listed Marvell Technology, Inc., not a crypto protocol token. The company is a fabless semiconductor designer that outsources chip manufacturing to foundries such as TSMC. It is positioned as a data infrastructure semiconductor company: rather than selling its own branded GPUs, it develops chips for AI data centers that “move data faster and connect machines together,” and also designs custom AI ASICs for cloud providers.

Community Views

The community believes MRVL’s earnings were strong, but not “explosive” enough. After the quarterly report on August 27, the stock fell sharply by about 6%–10%, exposing the divide between bulls and bears.

The broad community consensus is as follows:

1) The long-term narrative remains intact — cloud providers’ in-house chips + optical interconnects/switching, with Marvell clearly positioned in the value chain, and most institutions have not changed their bullish view.

2) Short-term sentiment is weak — good news was not good enough given that expectations for the Google order were pushed out beyond 2029, and that gross margins and valuation have become the new points of tension.

3) Bulls view this decline as a “buy-the-dip discussion,” while bears and those on the sidelines believe investors need to wait for the October investor day to clarify the custom pipeline and margins; otherwise, volatility is likely to remain elevated.