Home Knowledge BaseCoW DAO Monthly Recap: February 2026

CoW DAO Monthly Recap: February 2026

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Published Mar 3, 2026, 12:27 PM

February didn't just fly by - it shipped. From expanding across new infrastructure to sharpening governance frameworks and leveling up our grants program, here's everything that moved across the CoW DAO ecosystem this month.

Let's get into it.

Product & Integrations

CoW Protocol Launches on Ink

We've officially launched on Ink, expanding CoW Protocol's presence across new infrastructure and giving even more users access to MEV-protected trading.

Ink's growing ecosystem now gets access to CoW Protocol's intent-based architecture - meaning better execution, aggregated liquidity, and protection from harmful MEV.

Powering Tydro Swaps on Ink

We're now powering Tydro swaps on Ink, broadening where and how CoW Protocol is used in production environments.

This is what IntentFi looks like in practice:

Users sign intents
Solvers compete
Surplus gets returned
Execution happens seamlessly

Under the hood, it's a coordination layer. On the surface, it's just smooth swaps. And that's exactly how it should feel.

Governance

February saw serious momentum on governance design - both on growth mechanisms and solver incentives.

CIP-Draft: CoW Swap Affiliate Program Framework

A new draft CIP proposes a structured CoW Swap Affiliate Program, introducing a referral framework with governance guardrails.

The goal? Enable growth while preserving protocol integrity. Key focus areas include:

Transparent referral structure
Clear reward mechanics
Governance oversight

Community discussion is ongoing on the forum, and feedback is actively shaping the proposal. Join the discussion.

CIP-Draft: Performance and Consistency Rewards

This proposal rethinks how solver rewards are distributed. Instead of purely performance-based competition, the draft suggests splitting rewards between:

Performance (price competition)
Consistency (reliable participation across all trades)

Performance rewards would be capped at 50% of protocol revenue, with the remainder allocated to incentivize broader, dependable solver behavior.

Why this matters: Competitive pricing is critical, but reliability across all market conditions is equally essential. This proposal aims to balance both.

Join the discussion.

Grants Program

RFP: CoW Protocol Integration Documentation

We launched a new RFC focused on improving CoW Protocol's integration documentation. The objective:

Reduce partner friction.
Streamline order creation.
Make integrations easier and faster.

We're inviting proposals for:

AI-driven documentation upgrades
Targeted documentation improvements
Developer-focused clarity enhancements

Applications are open. Learn more about it here.

RFP: CoW Value Distribution Mechanism

After a detailed evaluation process, the Grants Council (in collaboration with the Core team) has selected Aragon to lead the CoW Value Distribution Mechanism engagement.

This marks an important step in formalizing how value flows within the ecosystem - and strengthening governance infrastructure for the long term.

More details can be found here.

Community & Visibility

The herd keeps growing. Our social teams have been doing great work building the herd. In February we saw:

12,000 members on Discord
66.8K followers on Twitter

Intent-based architecture is no longer a niche concept - it's a live conversation.

Jacopo, CoW DAO’s marketing manager, spoke on a NEAR panel exploring intents and the future of trading infrastructure alongside ecosystem peers. Watch here.

We also celebrated CoW DAO Independence Week, marking four years of governance, product evolution, and building user-protective infrastructure in DeFi.

The TL:DR? From early experiments to 73M+ transactions and hundreds of billions in protected volume - the journey continues.