A central limit order book where every order, cancellation and fill is recorded on-chain. Buyers match against sellers by price and time priority, as on a centralised exchange — but the book lives on the blockchain, not on a company’s servers.
Why almost nobody else does this
An order book generates enormous message volume. Market makers post, cancel and repost continuously, and most orders never fill. On a general-purpose chain that fails three ways: blocks too slow, throughput too low, gas that makes cancellation prohibitive.
Other decentralised venues gave something up. Some match off-chain and settle on-chain, which means trusting an operator. Others replaced the book with a pool, which means your price comes from a formula rather than a counterparty.
What you can see that you can’t elsewhere
Every resting order. Every fill with its timestamp. Depth at each level, verifiable rather than reported. On a centralised exchange you see what the operator shows you.
What it changes for execution
Real depth means a large order can be worked into the market rather than swallowed by a curve. Time priority rewards resting orders. Free cancellation means an algorithm can reprice continuously without the cost exceeding the slippage it saves.
That combination is why systematic execution works here and doesn’t on pool-based venues.