Uniswap (UNI) exchange rate
According to CoinMarketCap, as of December 2024, the Uniswap altcoin ranks 21st in the overall cryptocurrency rankings and is the leading token in its segment.
The emergence of the token and the DeFi boom (2020 —2021)
The Uniswap native token under the ticker UNI was released and appeared on exchanges in September 2020 in an airdrop. This airdrop was one of the most unexpected but sensational and large-scale in 2020-2021. Also, it launched an entire trend of retro drops: Uniswap prompted many users to trade on decentralized exchanges to get possible tokens from other DEX venues, many of which followed the lead of the leading DeFi trading platform.
This, coupled with other factors such as the Fed's key rate cut, the influx of investment, and the popularity of memcoins and NFTs, played a significant role in a massive new crypto boom in 2021.
At the time of listing, the price of the Uniswap token was $3.48, and already in the middle of the same month - September 2020 — the value of UNI dropped more than eight times its all-time low of $0.41. However, the price of the UNI token soon resumed its growth amid the general rise of the crypto market, and by the end of the year, it reached ~$3.5, rising slightly above the value at the time of listing.
The most rapid growth of the Uniswap cryptocurrency came in the first half of 2021 — just at the height of the DeFi boom. By the end of February, the price of UNI rose more than 8 times to $28.9, and in early May, it reached its all-time high (ATH) at $44.9, which remains valid as of December 2024.
In May of the same year, the crypto market collapsed due to China's crackdown on the market and statements by Tesla CEO Ilon Musk, who reversed his decision to accept Bitcoin for payment due to concerns about the environmental impact of mining. Following the leading cryptocurrency, altcoins, including Uniswap, began to collapse. By the end of May, the value of UNI dropped to $16.7, more than 2.5 times lower than the absolute maximum.
After Uniswap's short-term surge to $28.6 in June, the cryptocurrency's decline continued, and by July, its value had fallen to $14.5. Then, in August, a new wave of cryptocurrency growth emerged in the crypto market on the back of central banks' monetary policy, which strengthened investors' inflationary expectations. Also, a major Ethereum upgrade called London may have played a role in this growth.
During this period, the value of UNI cryptocurrency more than doubled by the end of August and reached $30.5. However, the growth was short-lived, and in the same month, the value of the Uniswap token began to fall again. This decline continued until June 2022, when the UNI rate fell to a one-year low of $3.82, slightly higher than the token's value at the time of listing.
Cryptocurrency collapse and protracted correction (2022 — 2023)
2022 was an unfavorable year for cryptocurrencies due to the collapse of one of the largest blockchain ecosystems, Terra, in May and the bankruptcy of the third largest crypto exchange by trading volume, FTX, in November.
While the value of the UNI token gradually declined over the course of eight months, it collapsed more than three times further after the Terra collapse. After a brief price spike in June that lasted until August, when the Uniswap token reached $8.3, the altcoin's value continued to fall gradually until October 2023, when it dropped to $4.1. This was against a lack of positive news for the cryptocurrency sector.
A new wave of growth (2023 — 2024)
In October 2023, a new phase of growth in the crypto market began, and the prices of many digital assets, including the Uniswap token, resumed their upward trend amid increased trading volumes and liquidity. By the end of the year, the value of the UNI cryptocurrency had risen to $7.4.
And in March 2024, the price of UNI cryptocurrency more than doubled to $15.4. In addition to the general favorable background in the crypto market, the growth was facilitated by a new initiative from the team, which proposed distributing the revenues of the decentralized exchange Uniswap among the owners of the UNI token.
This was followed by another drop in the value of the Uniswap token with short-term bounces that lasted until the end of August 2024, when the price of UNI dropped to $5.76. Several negative factors contributed to this drop, such as:
- Federal Reserve key rate increase and harmful U.S. price index data;
- The sale of nearly 50,000 bitcoins by the German government in July;
- The distribution of funds to affected investors of the bankrupt Mt. Gox exchange in August;
- The issuance of additional UNI tokens.
By September of the same year, the Uniswap team had already released all remaining UNI tokens to the market, thus completing the four-year transfer cycle. In addition, essential protocol updates, such as improved liquidity pools and lower transaction fees, had been released, as well as increased trading volumes and liquidity on the DeFi market, where Uniswap's DEX exchange holds a leading position.
As a result, by early November, the UNI cryptocurrency had risen to $8.1. In the same month, the Uniswap team announced plans to release its Ethereum-based blockchain, and cryptocurrency loyalist Donald Trump won the U.S. presidential race, a positive event for the entire crypto market.
By early December, the value of the UNI token rose to $18.3, updating a three-year high, but then declined amid a general correction in the crypto market. As of the end of December 2024, the value of the Uniswap cryptocurrency is $13.8.