Increased Trade Activities on Decentralized Exchanges Surpassing $463 Billion per Month
Growing Trends in Decentralized and Centralized Exchange Markets
In December 2021, significant trends emerged in the world of decentralized exchange (DEX) and centralized exchange (CEX) markets, with rapid growth in DEX trading volumes and the dominance of established CEX platforms.
For DEXs, the major trend was the increasing popularity of permissionless, non-custodial trading. Platforms such as Uniswap, SushiSwap, and PancakeSwap saw strong volume growth due to their decentralized finance (DeFi) ties, offering faster token listings, broader asset availability, and enhanced user control compared to CEXs. The volume on DEXs was surging, and many new DEX projects emerged, supported by liquidity aggregation services like 0x and 1inch.
Uniswap, in particular, led the pack with a trading volume of $106.4 billion, followed closely by PancakeSwap at $96.4 billion and Raydium at $58 billion. Despite these impressive figures, the trading volume on DEXs was significantly lower than the trading volume on CEXs during the same period.
For CEXs, well-established exchanges like Binance, Coinbase, Kraken, and Huobi continued to dominate trading volumes through their full-service centralized models. Offering robust liquidity, strong fiat-crypto on-ramps, regulatory adherence, and additional financial products, these exchanges maintained their strong positions. Coinbase and Binance were especially notable for expanding their offerings to integrate decentralized features on top of their centralized infrastructure.
Approximately $950 billion of the centralized exchange trading volume was attributed to Binance, making it the most dominant player in the CEX market. The trading volume on Binance accounted for a significant portion of the total trading volume on centralized exchanges during the same period. During that period, the spot trading volume on centralized exchanges hit a three-year high of $2.78 trillion.
The landscape was characterized by a growing interplay and convergence between centralized and decentralized exchange models. Regulatory factors were becoming increasingly significant, especially for US-based users.
Key trends as of that period included:
- Rising volume across DEXs, driven by the DeFi wave and user preference for self-custody and permissionless access.
- Integrations and hybrid models, where centralized exchanges like Coinbase began incorporating DEX functionalities to give users on-chain trading options without leaving the platform.
- Regulatory considerations influencing product availability, with major CEXs enforcing geo-restrictions while innovating compliance frameworks.
- Liquidity aggregation across multiple DEXs for better trade execution, exemplified by services like 0x and 1inch.
The total trading volume on decentralized exchanges in December reached an all-time high of $463 billion, confirming the growing popularity of DEXs. However, the overall trading volume on CEXs far outpaced that of DEXs, underscoring the continued dominance of established centralized platforms.
(Data from August 2025 confirms that this trend has continued, with platforms like Coinbase adding DEX capabilities to their apps to offer users on-chain trading seamlessly integrated with centralized interfaces[1][2][3].)
| Exchange Type | Notable Players | Key Characteristics | |--------------------|------------------------------------|----------------------------------------------| | Decentralized (DEX) | Uniswap, SushiSwap, PancakeSwap | Permissionless trading, on-chain order execution, growing TVL and volume | | Centralized (CEX) | Binance, Coinbase, Kraken, Huobi | High liquidity, strong fiat-crypto on-ramps, regulatory adherence, broad user base |
- In the realm of decentralized finance (DeFi), the growth of permissionless, non-custodial trading platforms like Uniswap, SushiSwap, and PancakeSwap continued to dominate trends in decentralized exchange (DEX) markets, offering faster token listings, broader asset availability, and enhanced user control compared to centralized exchange (CEX) platforms.
- The technology underlying these DEXs, such as liquidity aggregation services like 0x and 1inch, was enhancing trade execution by providing better access to liquidity across multiple DEXs.
