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Aerodrome and Velodrome merged into Aero, a single decentralized exchange now live on seven networks, with AERO and VELO converting into one token and locked positions becoming sAERO.
Server racks in a data center. Photo via Wikimedia Commons. Source
Aerodrome and Velodrome upgraded together into Aero on Oct. 21 at 8:00 p.m. EDT, forming a single decentralized exchange that went live across seven networks: Ethereum mainnet, Base, Arbitrum, OP Mainnet, Ink, Arc and Robinhood Chain, according to CoinMarketCap, which cited Dromos Labs, the exchange's core development company. The project's launch hub set the same timeline.
Emissions on both predecessor protocols stopped at the cutover; new AERO emissions began on the merged exchange, and upgrade portals opened on aerodrome.finance and velodrome.finance.
Existing AERO tokens convert to the new AERO at 1:1. Each VELO token converts at 0.044 AERO, a rate the launch hub said reflects Velodrome holders receiving 5.5% of the new supply and Aerodrome holders receiving 94.5%. Locked veAERO and veVELO positions become sAERO, with remaining lock durations extended and rounded up to full weeks; permanently locked tokens convert to the maximum stake duration.
Nothing converts automatically. Self-custodied holders must migrate through the upgrade portals after claiming rewards and clearing active votes, CoinMarketCap reported. CoinLab described the same manual process, and the launch hub said the upgrade is irreversible once completed.
Liquid AERO and VELO holders could begin upgrading at 8:00 p.m. EDT on Oct. 21. veNFT positions that voted in the final Aerodrome and Velodrome epochs had to wait until 9:00 p.m. EDT so final rewards and rebases could be claimed first, the hub said. Each upgrade retires the old veNFT ID and creates a new sAERO position; remaining lock time carries over, rounded up to the next full week, and permanent locks convert at maximum stake duration.
The 94.5% to 5.5% supply split matches each protocol's share of combined revenue over the 52 weeks before the merger was announced, according to the report. The hub put expected new AERO supply at a maximum of about 2.127 billion tokens, with any tokens left un-upgraded kept out of circulation permanently.
Aerodrome's pools handled about 51.5% of decentralized exchange volume on Base over the trailing 30 days, against 20% for Uniswap V3, according to DefiLlama data the report cited. Velodrome took about 56.5% on OP Mainnet, where no rival exceeded 15%.
The seven launch networks together handled roughly $112 billion in DEX volume over a 30-day window, versus $30.6 billion for Base and OP Mainnet combined, the same DefiLlama data shows. Robinhood Chain alone accounted for $34.4 billion of that total, more than Base itself.
Combined TVL of the two platforms was about $422 million as of Oct. 9, according to figures CoinLab attributed to KuCoin News.
Aero introduces Predictive Allocation, under which holders stake AERO to direct liquidity provider rewards toward markets they expect will generate fees, earning a share of what those markets produce. Rewards are reallocated in real time rather than through the weekly gauge votes the predecessor protocols used. Each sAERO position carries a 47-hour cooldown between allocation changes at launch, the project hub said. The hub also noted that one sAERO position can direct rewards to pools on any Aero chain in a single transaction, paying gas on Base only. CoinMarketCap described the mechanism as untested at launch.
Dromos Labs said all exchange revenue at launch goes to sAERO holders. Founder and CEO Alex Cutler said Aerodrome's share of trading in tokenized stocks on Ethereum and its layer-2 networks rose from about 2% in early September to 57% on Oct. 10, the report said.
"Every market is coming onchain, and any institution that can be distilled into code will be," Cutler said. "Aero takes that model to some of the biggest markets onchain, and 100% of the revenue it earns goes back to the people who stake AERO."
Aero also launches with Metaswaps for cross-network trading and Slipstream V3, a concentrated liquidity design with dynamic fees, CoinLab reported.
Velodrome will continue to support trading and liquidity deposits, without its token economy, on Celo, Fraxtal, Soneium and Unichain, the launch hub said. Holders who miss the manual migration window keep their claim through the upgrade portals rather than an automatic conversion; the hub said there is no set upgrade deadline, though legacy front ends may shut down later.