The paper investigates speculative Oracle Extractable Value (OEV) on Layer-2 blockchains, demonstrating that predictable latency differences in cross-chain oracle updates allow for profitable cross-ch…

The paper analyzes Ethereum builder transactions to show that builder centralization is an emergent property of the Proposer-Builder Separation (PBS) architecture, driven by specific order flow and ME…

The paper revisits the source of MEV by proposing an extended discrete-time AMM model that incorporates price jumps, demonstrating that CEX-DEX arbitrage profits can match or exceed MEV, thus providin…

This paper models Ethereum's mempool as a dynamic scheduling problem using an MDP, showing that dynamic pricing stabilizes the system and maximizes long-run rewards, and that the optimal policy conver…

The paper introduces MEV non-interference, a formal security notion, to ensure that composing new smart contracts in DeFi does not increase the maximal extractable value, thereby providing a formal fo…

The paper designs an optimal mechanism for soliciting expensive computational tasks in adversarial blockchain environments, showing that the loss of optimality scales logarithmically with the cost of…

The paper analyzes transaction selection strategies in DAG-based distributed ledgers using game theory, finding that Collaborative Fee Sharing (CFS) achieves superior performance compared to Random Fe…

The paper analyzes arbitrage competition on high-throughput blockchains, finding that while probabilistic search accounts for a small fraction of activity, it is disproportionately responsible for spa…

The paper demonstrates that on public blockchains, the ability to dictate transaction order (ordering power) is the true source of sanctioning power, as block producers can extract value (SE-MEV) by p…

This paper analyzes the conditions under which Bitcoin's security might fail due to miners deviating from honest mining when block rewards decline to zero, concluding that protocol mechanisms can miti…

The paper analyzes transaction fee mechanisms in modern blockchains that use parallel execution and contingency, proving an inherent trade-off between minimizing risks for users and maximizing revenue…

The paper introduces ClawCoin, a novel tokenized, compute-cost-indexed unit of account designed to solve the problem of non-transferable compute costs in decentralized AI agent economies.

MEV-ACE introduces a fair ordering protocol that mitigates proposer-controlled MEV by combining authenticated economic identities, auditable commit/open messages, and verifiable delay randomness to en…

This paper analyzes the x402 payment protocol, revealing systemic vulnerabilities in state synchronization and signature design that allow attackers to exploit payment systems for resource leakage in…

This paper analyzes the x402 payment protocol, revealing critical synchronization and security flaws that allow attackers to exploit payment systems and force merchants to subsidize compute costs.

This empirical study of Pearl's cuPOW protocol demonstrates that the network's Proof-of-Useful-Work mechanism generates zero useful AI computation, instead causing economic harm and displacing legitim…

The paper analyzes the nascent DeFi investment agent market, finding that while token valuations are high, current deployments are heterogeneous, lack clear autonomous execution, and exhibit poor risk…

The paper empirically analyzes the nascent DeFi investment agent market, finding that while token valuations are high, current deployments lack robust autonomous execution and exhibit poor risk-adjust…

The paper introduces SuperPaymaster, an Asset-Oriented Abstraction (AOA) paymaster that eliminates the need for a centralized off-chain signer, thereby improving the decentralization and efficiency of…

The paper systematizes the interaction between autonomous AI agents and blockchain platforms using a bidirectional trust framework, identifying significant gaps in current standards and proposing a ta…