A review of more than 150 prominent crypto protocols found that disclosure of market-making arrangements is nearly nonexistent, despite their importance to token trading.
Research by crypto advisory firm Novora showed fewer than 1% of protocols reveal any market-maker terms. Across the dataset, only one protocol—decentralized liquidity platform Meteora—had publicly shared details of its market-making arrangements, citing its 2025 Annual Token Holder Report.
The study examined leading sectors including decentralized exchanges, lending platforms, perpetual futures, layer-1 and layer-2 networks, bridges and centralized exchange tokens, covering protocols with fully diluted valuations from about $40 million to $45 billion. Novora assessed projects with a binary transparency framework focused on disclosure practices and third-party data coverage, cross-checking public sources such as Artemis, Token Terminal, Dune, DeFiLlama and Blockworks Research.
“This is the single most consequential transparency gap in the industry,” Novora founder Connor King wrote on X, noting that material agreements like these are routinely disclosed in traditional markets. “In crypto, every market participant operates without this information,” he added.
Novora’s review also highlighted a broader investor-relations gap. While 91% of the protocols produced trackable revenue, only 18% published quarterly updates and just 8% issued token holder reports—indicating that the data often exists but is seldom packaged into formal investor communications. Third-party analytics coverage is relatively mature, with rates above 85% across major platforms, suggesting underlying data is widely accessible even if reporting lags.
Sector-level results showed uneven transparency: perpetual futures protocols and decentralized exchanges generally scored better on disclosure and value-accrual transparency, while layer-1 and infrastructure projects trailed despite their larger market caps.
Opaque market-maker deals have long drawn scrutiny in crypto, especially token loan arrangements critics say can incentivize dumping borrowed tokens. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has previously charged entities it described as crypto market makers with manipulation. Some arrangements—like the “loan option model,” where projects lend tokens to market makers for liquidity provision and trading tied to listings—are accused of creating incentives for market makers to sell borrowed tokens, depressing prices and harming early-stage projects’ liquidity and token performance.
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