1inch Aqua is live, bringing shared liquidity to DeFi. To kick off the launch, incentive campaigns on Merkl let liquidity providers earn rewards.
Aqua is a shared liquidity layer for DeFi, and it changes how liquidity provision works.
Until now, providing liquidity meant committing your tokens to a specific pool. Your balance was split across positions and locked inside each one. Whatever you chose, you left capital on the table somewhere else.
Aqua works differently. You connect your wallet and back as many positions as you want with the same tokens. For each one, you pick a pair, a price range, and a swap fee. Your tokens stay in your wallet and move only when a swap fills against one of your positions.
That is what shared liquidity means: one wallet, many positions, all backed by the same tokens. And because the same tokens can back several positions at once, they have more chances to be where a swap happens, so there is more potential to earn swap fees.
The same 4 WETH sitting in your wallet can stand behind WETH/USDC, WETH/USDT, WETH/DAI and WETH/WBTC at the same time, instead of being divided into four separate pools.
Your assets stay in your wallet the whole time, fully self-custodial. They are pulled and pushed back in a single atomic transaction, only when a swap executes.
To bootstrap liquidity from day one, the 1inch Network has launched an incentive program on Aqua, operated by Merkl. Liquidity providers earn rewards on top of the swap fees they already collect.
The program puts 10M 1INCH behind Aqua liquidity over three months: 5M in direct volume rewards across 80+ markets, and 5M in partner co-incentive campaigns, launching with BNB Chain as the first partner. An additional 500K USDC boost is proposed to the 1inch DAO.
Each market pairs 1INCH with a major onchain asset, grouped into a few categories:
ETH and liquid staking tokens, like WETH and wstETH
Stablecoins, like USDC, USDT and DAI
BTC wrappers, like WBTC and cbBTC
DeFi blue chips, like AAVE, UNI, LINK, ONDO and ENA
Real-world assets, including tokenized gold and equities
Markets run across Ethereum, BNB Chain and Robinhood Chain.
Rewards go to liquidity that actually gets used. Makers are paid pro-rata to the swap volume their positions handle, not for parking capital. Every reward is tied to a verifiable onchain action: providing liquidity that powers real swaps on Aqua. The more volume your positions handle, the more you earn.
Rewards are distributed through Merkl and claimable on the Merkl App or directly on the 1inch incentive page.
1. Connect your wallet on Aqua and back a position on an eligible 1INCH market
2. Let swaps fill against your positions. Rewards accrue from the volume they handle
3. Track and claim your rewards on the Merkl App