Ethereum PropAMMs: today and tomorrow

Ethereum PropAMMs: today and tomorrow

Ethereum’s new class of Proposition‑Automated Market Makers (PropAMMs) is reshaping how liquidity is supplied and traded on the network. While Solana’s first‑in‑class PropAMMs already command a sizable share of on‑chain volume, Ethereum’s version—most notably Titan—has introduced a set of protocol‑level guarantees that make active market making feasible in a high‑fee, low‑throughput environment.

1. What are PropAMMs and why do they matter?

A PropAMM is a smart‑contract‑based market maker that proposes a price and liquidity curve to the network. Two key transaction types interact with the contract:

• Take – a user or arbitrageur trades against the current state of the PropAMM.
• Update – the market maker pushes a new price‑and‑liquidity quote.

Because the maker’s quote can become stale between updates, the design must solve two core problems: (1) protecting makers from latency races with aggressive takers, and (2) ensuring enough throughput to keep the contract state fresh.

2. Solana vs. Ethereum: different constraints, similar goals

| Problem | Solana solution | Ethereum (Titan) solution | |---------|-----------------|---------------------------| | Latency races | Continuous block building (400 ms slots split into 50 ms batches) and fee‑per‑compute‑unit ordering give makers a high probability of being included first. | Maker priority guarantees that any take is preceded by a maker update in the same block. Maker freshness requires a take to be at least 50 ms older than the latest update, giving makers a last‑look advantage. | | Throughput | Solana’s high bandwidth and low congestion allow makers to broadcast millions of updates per day at modest cost (≈$10 k/day for Humidifi). | Ethereum’s lower throughput and dynamic base‑fee make continuous updates expensive. Titan introduces conditional inclusion: a maker update is only written to chain if a corresponding take is routed through the PropAMM, turning updates into a pay‑per‑use model. |

Both ecosystems rely on a mix of on‑chain logic and off‑chain coordination (e.g., Jito on Solana, PBS on Ethereum) to achieve the required speed and cost efficiency.

3. Current market share and growth prospects

In the week of 14–20 Sept 2026, Ethereum’s PropAMMs handled roughly 5–10 % of total swapping volume, with Fermi and Metric contributing $280 m and $178 m respectively. By contrast, Solana’s top PropAMMs (BisonFi, HumidiFi, Tessera V) account for about 40 % of the combined volume of the largest Solana venues. As Ethereum’s gas prices stabilize and builders continue to refine PBS ordering, the share of PropAMM volume on Ethereum is expected to climb, potentially matching Solana’s dominance.

4. Second‑order effects on MEV and PBS

PropAMMs change the MEV landscape in two ways:

1. Reduced arbitrage opportunities – Because the maker’s quote is always visible and updated in near‑real time, arbitrageurs have less incentive to front‑run or sandwich trades.
2. Builder incentives – Builders now have a new revenue stream: they can earn fees by ordering maker updates ahead of takes, and by providing the maker priority guarantee that Titan requires.

These dynamics may lead to a more collaborative relationship between market makers and builders, potentially easing the “builder‑vs‑miner” tension that has plagued Ethereum’s transaction ordering debates.

5. Practical take‑away for developers and traders

• For market makers – If you’re building a PropAMM on Ethereum, focus on the conditional inclusion logic and the 50 ms freshness window. These features dramatically cut down on unnecessary blockspace usage and keep your costs predictable.
• For traders – PropAMMs offer tighter spreads and less slippage compared to traditional AMMs, especially in volatile markets. However, be mindful of the 50 ms delay before a take can be executed; this can affect high‑frequency strategies.

6. Looking ahead

Ethereum’s PropAMMs are still in their infancy, but the architecture is already robust enough to support high‑volume, low‑latency market making. As builders refine PBS and gas markets mature, we anticipate a surge in both the number of PropAMM protocols and the total volume they handle. The next wave will likely see cross‑chain interoperability, more sophisticated pricing models, and tighter integration with Layer‑2 rollups.

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TL;DR: Ethereum’s Titan PropAMM uses maker priority and freshness guarantees plus a pay‑per‑use update model to overcome latency and throughput challenges, enabling market makers to compete with Solana’s high‑volume PropAMMs and reshaping the MEV and PBS landscape.