Wash-Trading

Wash-Trading

Wash trading means artificially generated trading volume. One party essentially trades with itself — across multiple wallets — to create the impression of activity, demand, or liquidity.

Why it is done

• Visibility: high volume pushes tokens up rankings and trending lists.
• Faking trust: busy “trading” looks like genuine interest to observers.
• NFT markets: repeated buys between one’s own wallets inflate apparent floor prices.

Detectable on-chain

Since all trades are public, wash trading stands out through patterns: circular trading within a wallet cluster, unusually even volumes, or volume without corresponding price movement.