Why the 'MEV Burn' Debate Misses the Architectural Point

Monolithic chains force execution, settlement, and data availability onto a single, congested layer. This creates a zero-sum game for block space where MEV is a symptom, not the disease.

• Key Benefit 1: Separating execution (rollups) from settlement/deduplication (L1) via EigenLayer and Celestia.
• Key Benefit 2: Enables ~90% cost reduction for L2s by moving data availability off-chain.

Transaction-based models force users to specify how to trade, exposing them to front-running. Intent-based systems like UniswapX and CowSwap let users declare what they want, outsourcing execution to a competitive solver network.

• Key Benefit 1: Eliminates failed transactions and sandwich attacks by design.
• Key Benefit 2: ~15% better prices for users via optimized cross-domain routing (e.g., Across, Socket).

Hundreds of rollups and appchains create a $50B+ liquidity silo problem. Bridging is slow, expensive, and insecure, relying on centralized multisigs or nascent light clients.

• Key Benefit 1: Shared sequencers (e.g., Espresso, Astria) enable atomic cross-rollup composability.
• Key Benefit 2: Universal interoperability layers like LayerZero and Polymer abstract away chain boundaries, targeting sub-2 second finality for cross-chain messages.

Trust in centralized sequencers and oracles is the next major attack vector. The endgame is cryptographically verified off-chain computation.

• Key Benefit 1: ZK coprocessors (e.g., Risc Zero, Axiom) enable on-chain apps to trustlessly query and compute over historical state.
• Key Benefit 2: Proving markets (e.g., Succinct, Georli) commoditize ZK proof generation, driving costs toward ~$0.01 per proof.

Ethereum's post-Merge roadmap cedes control of block building and ordering to a fragmented, off-chain ecosystem of builders and relays. This creates systemic risks and complexity.

• Centralization Risk: ~90% of blocks are built by 3-4 entities.
• Protocol Leakage: Value and control leak to opaque, off-chain systems.
• User Abstraction Failure: End-users must navigate a maze of RPC endpoints and bundles.

Projects like dYdX, Celestia, and Fuel reject L1 sequencing entirely. They build their own dedicated, high-performance execution and sequencing environments.

• Full Control: The application defines its own block space and transaction ordering rules.
• Custom MEV Policy: MEV can be captured, redistributed, or eliminated by the app's own logic.
• Architectural Simplicity: Removes reliance on external builder markets and relays.

Ethereum's core devs, via EIP-4844 and PBS roadmaps, are fighting to bring critical functions back on-chain in a trust-minimized way. This is the real 'burn'.

• Protocol-Captured Value: MEV can be efficiently routed and potentially redistributed via the protocol itself.
• Credible Neutrality: Removes builder/relay cartel risks through cryptographic commitments.
• Long-Term Alignment: Ensures the L1 remains the fundamental economic and security layer.

Espresso Systems, Astria, and Radius are building neutral, decentralized sequencing networks for rollups. This is the middleware battleground.

• Interoperability: Enables atomic cross-rollup composability without L1 latency.
• Decentralization: Replaces solo sequencers with a shared, staked validator set.
• MEV Management: Provides a transparent layer for MEV redistribution strategies across an entire rollup ecosystem.

In current designs, MEV is an unavoidable, opaque cost paid by end-users, extracted by sophisticated bots. Burning it doesn't solve the user experience or economic distortion.

• Wasted Gas: Frontrun and backrun transactions waste ~5-10% of network gas.
• Price Inefficiency: DEX arbitrage lag creates persistent, exploitable spreads.
• Censorship Vector: Transactions can be excluded from blocks for maximal extractable value.

UniswapX, CowSwap, and Flashbots SUAVE shift the paradigm from transaction execution to outcome fulfillment. Users state a goal, solvers compete.

• MEV Absorption: Solver competition internalizes and neutralizes extractable value.
• Better Execution: Users get price improvements, not frontruns.
• Architectural Endgame: Transforms the mempool from a hostile arena into a cooperative solving engine.

Focusing on burning MEV revenue is a political solution to an architectural problem. It doesn't solve the core issues of transaction ordering, censorship resistance, or cross-domain value leakage.

• Architectural Lock-In: Burn mechanisms bake in a specific block-building model, limiting future innovation in PBS or proposer-builder separation.
• Value Destruction: Burns $100M+ in potential protocol revenue that could fund security or R&D, a luxury only the largest L1s can afford.
• Missed Point: The real goal is not to destroy MEV, but to minimize harmful MEV and democratize its capture.

Shift the paradigm from transaction execution to outcome fulfillment. Protocols like UniswapX, CowSwap, and Across abstract complexity away from users and let solvers compete on efficiency.

• User Sovereignty: Users specify what they want, not how to get it, reducing frontrunning surface.
• Solver Competition: Creates a competitive market for execution, driving down costs and capturing MEV for user benefit.
• Cross-Chain Native: Intents are naturally portable, making them the ideal primitive for a multi-chain world, unlike rigid burn mechanics.

The true architectural war is over who controls the sequencing layer. Projects like Espresso, Astria, and Radius are building neutral, decentralized sequencers that separate consensus from execution.

• Neutral Mempool: Prevents chain-specific MEV cartels and enables cross-rollup atomic composability.
• Proposer-Builder Separation (PBS): Decouples block production from validation, a proven model from Ethereum, reducing centralization pressure.
• Strategic Leverage: Whoever controls the shared sequencer controls the flow of value and information for hundreds of rollups.

The future is a stack of specialized layers: execution, settlement, data availability, and a separate, liquid market for block space and ordering rights.

• Commoditized Builders: Specialized block builders compete in an open market, not a chain-specific cabal.
• MEV as a Yield Source: Validator/staker rewards are supplemented by MEV smoothing and distribution mechanisms, not burns.
• Interoperability First: Protocols like LayerZero and Chainlink CCIP will plug into these markets, making cross-chain MEV a manageable, priced risk instead of an extractive exploit.