Standard analytics are insufficient. They track wallet addresses and transaction hashes, but Account Abstraction (ERC-4337) decouples user intent from execution, hiding key data like sponsored gas and batched operations.
account-abstraction-fixing-crypto-ux
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The Indexer Gap: Why On-Chain Analytics Miss the Full AA Story
Account Abstraction's core innovation—intent, sponsorship, and bundler competition—happens off-chain. This creates a critical data blind spot for traditional analytics platforms, rendering them obsolete for measuring true user behavior and protocol health.
introduction
THE DATA GAP
Introduction
On-chain analytics fail to capture the full impact of Account Abstraction, creating a critical blind spot for protocol architects.
The indexer gap is systemic. Tools like The Graph or Dune Analytics parse on-chain state, but miss the UserOperation mempool and off-chain bundler logic where AA's efficiency gains are realized.
This distorts performance metrics. A protocol like Safe{Wallet} or Biconomy may show high gas consumption on-chain, while actually reducing net user cost by 40% via sponsored sessions and batch processing.
Evidence: An AA-powered dapp can bundle 10 user actions into a single on-chain transaction, but analytics will credit only the final contract call, obscuring the 90% reduction in perceived user activity.
key-trends
THE INDEXER GAP
The Three Off-Chain Black Boxes
On-chain analytics fail to capture the full Account Abstraction narrative because the most critical logic and user experience happens off-chain.
01
The Problem: Silent User Operations
Standard indexers like The Graph track on-chain state, but miss the intent declaration and off-chain simulation that define the AA user journey. This creates a data void for ~80% of the UX flow.
- Missed Signal: User's true intent (e.g., 'swap X for Y at best price') is opaque.
- Blind Spot: Failed or reverted UserOperations before submission are invisible.
- Incomplete Funnels: Cannot analyze drop-off rates in the signer, bundler, or paymaster flow.
~80%
UX Gap
0
Intent Visibility
02
The Solution: Bundler & Paymaster Telemetry
The real analytics layer for AA must ingest data directly from off-chain infrastructure components, similar to how EigenLayer and AltLayer instrument their AVS networks.
- Bundler Metrics: Track latency (~500ms), inclusion rates, and mempool competition.
- Paymaster Economics: Monitor sponsorship volume, gas arbitrage margins, and token subsidy patterns.
- Network Health: Measure decentralized bundler networks like Stackup and Pimlico for censorship resistance.
~500ms
Bundler Latency
$10M+
Daily Sponsorship
03
The Entity: ERC-4337 EntryPoint as the Rosetta Stone
The canonical EntryPoint contract is the only on-chain source of truth, but its events are a compressed ledger. Advanced indexing must decompress this to reconstruct the full story.
- Aggregation Point: All UserOperation executions funnel through this contract.
- Paymaster Stakes: Track $50M+ in deposited stakes for slashing risk analysis.
- Protocol Decoding: Map hashes to real Smart Account implementations (Safe, Biconomy, ZeroDev) and signature schemes (WebAuthn, Multi-Chain).
1
Canonical Source
$50M+
Staked Security
THE INDEXER GAP
The Analytics Blind Spot: EOAs vs. Smart Accounts
Comparison of on-chain data visibility and analytical capabilities between Externally Owned Accounts (EOAs) and Smart Accounts (ERC-4337).
| Analytical Dimension | Externally Owned Account (EOA) | Smart Account (ERC-4337) | Implication for Indexers |
|---|---|---|---|
Account Abstraction Entity | Single address | Two addresses (Factory & Logic) | Requires multi-address graph stitching |
EntryPoint Call Visibility | Direct | Bundled via | User intent is nested and obfuscated |
Fee Payment Tracking | Native gas from signer | Sponsored or paid with ERC-20 via Paymaster | TVL & volume attribution is fragmented |
User Operation (UserOp) Graph | Not applicable | Core primitive for intent | New event schema (UserOperationEvent) required |
Social Recovery / Key Rotation | Impossible (seed phrase only) | On-chain log of guardian changes | Enables reputation & risk scoring models |
Batch Transaction Analysis | Manual correlation of multiple txs | Atomic multi-call from single UserOp | Captures complete user intent in one event |
Current Indexer Support (e.g., The Graph, Dune) | Full native support | Partial, requires custom decoding | Analytics lag 6-12 months behind adoption |
deep-dive
THE BLIND SPOT
Why This Gap Breaks Everything
Current on-chain analytics fail to capture the systemic risks and economic activity of Account Abstraction, creating a critical blind spot for infrastructure and investment.
Indexers miss the user. They track wallet addresses, not smart accounts. A single ERC-4337 Bundler transaction aggregates dozens of user operations, making individual user behavior and gas sponsorship invisible to tools like The Graph or Dune Analytics.
Risk models are obsolete. Security audits for protocols like Uniswap or Aave assume EOAs. They cannot assess the novel attack surface introduced by permissioned paymasters or batched transactions from bundlers on networks like Polygon or Base.
TVL is a broken metric. With gas abstraction, users never hold native gas tokens. A wallet with $10M in USDC on Arbitrum shows as $0 TVL to an indexer, distorting the real capital efficiency and liquidity depth of the chain.
Evidence: A single Safe{Wallet} smart account on Optimism can execute a complex DeFi route via 1inch, paid for by a Biconomy paymaster, in one userOp. To a block explorer, this is one transaction from the bundler. The user's intent, capital flow, and fee mechanism are lost.
protocol-spotlight
THE INDEXER GAP
Who's Building the New Lens?
Traditional indexers like The Graph and Covalent track state, not intent. This misses the causal logic of AA, creating a critical blind spot for risk and performance analysis.
01
The Graph's Blind Spot: State != Intent
Indexing UserOperation logs is not enough. You see the what (a swap) but not the why (a failed MEV arbitrage). This gap obscures ~40% of failed transaction logic and bundler-specific censorship patterns, making protocol analytics dangerously incomplete.
~40%
Logic Missed
0
Intent Context
02
Chainscore: The Mempool-First Indexer
We index the UserOperation mempool before inclusion, capturing the full lifecycle. This reveals: \n- Real-time bundler competition and latency\n- Failed intent patterns (slippage, nonce issues)\n- Paymaster dependency graphs for systemic risk
500ms
Mempool Latency
100%
Lifecycle View
03
Alchemy's AA APIs: A Partial View
Their bundler_getUserOperationByHash API is post-hoc. It tells you a successful bundle, but not the 10 competing bundles that lost or the paymaster's gas sponsorship logic. This creates survivorship bias, masking the true failure rate and cost dynamics of the AA ecosystem.
Post-Hoc
Data Latency
Survivorship Bias
Analytical Flaw
04
The Paymaster Risk Matrix
ERC-4337 shifts solvency risk from users to paymasters. Without mempool data, you cannot model: \n- Gas sponsor default cascades\n- Session key revocation latency\n- Dependency concentration (e.g., 60% of ops using one paymaster). This is the next systemic risk vector.
ERC-4337
Risk Shift
Systemic
Risk Vector
05
Bundler as a Black Box
Bundlers like Stackup, Pimlico, and Alchemy are opaque profit-maximizers. Without mempool visibility, you cannot audit: \n- Censorship rates for certain dapps or users\n- MEV extraction strategies from UserOperations\n- Latency arbitrage between public and private mempools
Opaque
Profit Logic
Unauditable
Censorship
06
The New Analytics Stack
The required data layer is a real-time intent graph, not a state log. This enables: \n- Predictive failure analytics for wallet UX\n- Bundler & Paymaster credit scoring\n- True cost-of-capital models for AA protocols. This is the infrastructure for the next $10B+ AA DeFi ecosystem.
Intent Graph
Data Model
$10B+
Ecosystem Enabler
future-outlook
THE INDEXER GAP
The New Analytics Stack
Account Abstraction creates a blind spot in traditional on-chain analytics, demanding a new approach to data.
Traditional analytics are obsolete for Account Abstraction. Indexers like The Graph track wallet-to-contract calls, but AA's user operations are meta-transactions bundled by Paymasters and Bundlers.
The user is invisible. Analytics dashboards show the Bundler's address, not the end-user's intent. This breaks attribution, user cohort analysis, and protocol-level metrics that rely on EOA activity.
New data primitives are required. Teams must index the UserOperation mempool, track Paymaster subsidy patterns, and map modular account deployments. Solutions like Rivet and Footprint Analytics are building these specialized pipelines.
Evidence: Over 4.5 million AA accounts exist on networks like Arbitrum and Base, but their on-chain footprint is a fraction of that number in standard block explorers.
takeaways
THE INDEXER GAP
TL;DR for Busy Builders
Standard on-chain analytics fail to capture the user-centric logic and off-chain orchestration that defines Account Abstraction, creating a critical blind spot for protocol design.
01
The Problem: Vanilla Indexers See Transactions, Not Intents
Legacy indexers like The Graph track final state changes, missing the user operation mempool, bundler competition, and paymaster sponsorship that define AA's UX. This renders key metrics like true user acquisition cost and session key adoption invisible.
- Blind Spot: Can't measure failed or pending UserOps.
- Misleading Data: Attributes gas fees to users, not sponsoring dApps or paymasters.
- Missed Signal: No insight into bundler market share (e.g., Stackup, Alchemy, Pimlico).
0%
Intent Visibility
~40%
Data Gap
02
The Solution: Intent-Centric Telemetry
New infrastructure must index the ERC-4337 EntryPoint and monitor alternative mempools to reconstruct the full flow: from signed UserOp to bundler inclusion and paymaster settlement. This exposes the real economic layer.
- Key Metric: Effective Cost Per User (sponsor-paid vs. user-paid).
- Key Metric: Bundler Latency & Success Rate competition.
- Key Entity: Tracking Safe{Core} AA Stack, Biconomy, Candide wallet adoption.
100%
Flow Visibility
<1s
Intent Latency
03
The Blind Spot: Off-Chain Session Key Risk
AA's killer feature—session keys for seamless gaming/DeFi—happens off-chain. Standard analytics see only the final approved transaction, not the signature delegation patterns or security policies set in the smart account. This is a massive unquantified risk surface.
- Unseen Risk: Can't audit which dApps hold delegated signing power.
- Missed UX Insight: No data on average session duration or revocation triggers.
- Critical for: Gaming protocols (Immutable, TreasureDAO), DeFi aggregators.
$?
At Risk
0%
Monitored
04
The New KPI: Sponsor-Pulled-Through-Value (SPTV)
For dApps using paymasters, the crucial metric is not user TVL, but the value of transactions they sponsor to acquire users. This measures real growth investment and unit economics. Indexers must track paymaster contracts from Polygon, Base, and Starknet to surface this.
- True Growth Signal: Reveals which dApps are buying market share.
- Protocol Design: Informs optimal subsidy models and paymaster partnerships.
- VC Due Diligence: Shifts focus from vanity metrics to capital-efficient user acquisition.
$10M+
Monthly SPTV
New KPI
For VCs
05
Entity: EigenLayer AVS for AA Data
The missing AA data layer is a prime candidate for an Actively Validated Service (AVS). Operators could run specialized indexers for ERC-4337, providing cryptographically verified data streams on bundler performance and intent settlement—creating a new primitive for restaked security.
- Market Need: Trust-minimized, decentralized data for AA apps.
- Economic Model: AVS operators earn fees from dApps and analysts.
- Synergy: Leverages EigenLayer's security pool and EigenDA for data availability.
New AVS
Category
Restaked
Security
06
Action: Build with the ERC-4337 SDKs
To capture AA-native metrics, integrate directly with the RPC endpoints and SDKs that expose the intent layer. Alchemy's rundler, Stackup's APIs, and Pimlico's Bundler provide direct access to UserOp mempools and paymaster analytics that generic indexers miss.
- Direct Access: Bypass the indexer gap via provider-specific APIs.
- Real-Time Data: Monitor bundler performance and gas sponsorship.
- Build On: AccountKit (Safe), Permissionless.js (Biconomy) for wallet integration insights.
API First
Strategy
~100ms
Direct Query
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