1/ đź“ś New research just dropped on one of the darkest corners of MEV: CEX-DEX arbitrage.
@William33203632 @sui414 @soispoke @malleshpai mapped 7.2M trades and $233.8M in extracted value, using a custom Dune dataset.
Here’s what they found 🧵
2/ CEX-DEX arbitrage exploits price gaps between centralized and decentralized exchanges.
It accounts for <2% of blockspace, but >15% of block value on Ethereum.
That’s a massive slice of MEV most users never see.
3/ From Aug 2023 to Mar 2025, 19 searchers extracted $233.8M across $266B+ in volume.
4/ And the market is highly centralized.
The top 3 searchers—Wintermute, SCP, and Kayle—captured ~75% of total extracted value.
5/ Kayle’s rise was dramatic.
A minor player until mid-2024, Kayle suddenly exploded in volume, coinciding with Titan’s surge as a builder.
Statistical analysis shows a tight feedback loop:
Titan wins blocks → Kayle arbs → Titan grows → repeat
6/ Revenue ≠Profit
• Neutral searchers: route trades across multiple builders, bid competitively, and keep more upside.
• Exclusive/integrated searchers: share the bulk of revenue with their builder, securing inclusion at the cost of margin.
7/ Wintermute/rsync isn't dying, just evolving.
While rsync’s builder share fell below 5%, Wintermute’s profit margin rebounded by targeting only the most profitable trades.
They now profit more as a searcher than as a builder.
8/ This research gives us the clearest view yet of the MEV supply chain economics:
✅ Who’s extracting value
✅ Who’s keeping profit
✅ How exclusivity shapes Ethereum’s builder landscape
Explore all charts on Dune ⬇️
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