Earnings

Overview

Earnings measures the net value a project retains after subtracting all expenses from its revenue. This includes cost of revenue, token incentives, and operating expenses, where applicable. Note that earnings reflects onchain profitability, and may understate true costs in instances where the project does not report its operating expenses onchain.

Data sources

• Smart contract events and program instructions capturing revenue-generating activities and expense distributions
• Onchain transaction records and gas usage data
• Token price feeds for USD conversion
• Asset metadata for decimal precision

Common calculation approaches

Protocol revenue and incentive deduction

For decentralized finance applications, earnings are calculated by subtracting token incentives and operating costs from protocol revenue. For example, swap fees and liquidity mining incentives are tracked from PancakeSwap and Uniswap, while borrower interest and asset incentives are analyzed from Aave to determine net onchain profitability.

Layer 2 gas fee spread calculation

For Layer 2 blockchains, earnings are derived by subtracting Layer 1 settlement costs and other operational expenses from the total gas fees paid by users. For instance, on networks such as Base and Arbitrum One, sequencer revenue is captured from transaction fees, and expenses such as L1 batch submission costs are subtracted to calculate net earnings.

Note: The calculation approaches and protocol examples above are representative patterns. Individual protocol implementations may vary.