MEV Revenue Distribution
Published 6/21/2026, 9:10:20 AM
In the current Ethereum ecosystem, validators (proposers) benefit significantly more from MEV than block builders. While builders perform the complex task of transaction ordering, the competitive nature of the MEV-Boost auction forces them to pass the vast majority of their revenue to validators to ensure their blocks are included.
MEV Revenue Distribution
Under the Proposer-Builder Separation (PBS) model, the distribution of extracted MEV value is heavily skewed toward the end of the supply chain.
| Actor | Share of MEV Revenue | Primary Role |
|---|---|---|
| Validators | 72.1% – 90.5% | Select the highest bid from the builder auction. |
| Searchers | ~17.4% | Identify MEV (arbitrage/liquidations) and submit bundles. |
| Block Builders | 6.5% – 10.5% | Aggregate bundles into blocks and bid for inclusion. |
Why Validators Are the Primary Beneficiaries
Validators act as the ultimate "gatekeepers" of Ethereum's block space. Because multiple builders compete for a single slot, builders are incentivized to bid away almost all potential profit to the validator.
- Staking APY Boost: Validators using MEV-Boost see a significant increase in rewards. Median execution rewards are approximately 2.66x (166%) higher than local block building, leading to an overall lift in staking APY (e.g., from 2.97% to 3.29%).
- Revenue Floor: PBS has established a robust revenue floor for validators. The percentage of blocks with revenue less than 0.01 ETH dropped from 25.6% (pre-PBS) to just 0.4% under the current model.
- Democratization: The system allows solo stakers to access the same competitive builder market as large institutional pools, leveling the financial playing field for MEV capture.
The Builder's "Winner's Curse"
In contrast to validators, block builders operate on razor-thin or even negative margins to maintain market share.
- Subsidized Blocks: Approximately 40.5% of PBS blocks result in builders paying validators more than the MEV they actually extracted from the transactions. This is often done to maintain relationships with searchers or to gain "dominance" in the market.
- Thin Net Profits: In a study of $48.3M in extracted MEV, builders passed 93% ($30.3M) of their gross revenue directly to validators, leaving a net profit of only $4.4M for the builders themselves.
- Market Concentration: The builder market is highly oligopolistic, with the top two builders often controlling 85–90% of the market share. To survive, dominant builders like Flashbots and Beaverbuild often vertically integrate with searcher firms to offset building losses.
Future Outlook: ePBS (2026)
The transition to Enshrined PBS (ePBS), targeted for 2025/2026 via EIP-7732, aims to move this auction logic directly into the Ethereum protocol. This will eliminate the need for trusted third-party relays (which currently facilitate >85% of blocks) and introduce Inclusion Lists. These lists will allow validators to mandate the inclusion of specific transactions, potentially shifting the power balance further by reducing a builder's ability to censor or exclusively reorder certain transactions.
Conclusion: Validators are the primary financial winners of the MEV ecosystem, capturing up to 90% of the value, while builders operate as a highly competitive service layer with minimal profit margins.
Next Steps:
- Would you like to see a technical analysis of the top validator pools (Lido, Coinbase) to see how their MEV capture affects their token performance?
- I can monitor the MEV-Boost relay data for the next 24 hours to provide a real-time report on current builder profit margins.