Uniswap Range Order Tick Range Question

Question

Overview

I am trying to provide single sided range liquidity on the USDC/WETH pool.

I find myself having to lower the tick range in order to mint. As I understand per the docs that the higher priced token is only available to be added above the current rate. So if I wanted to provide liquidity for WETH at 1600 and current price is 1500 I would assume that I would need to raise the desired tick range to that 1600 level, but I find the opposite to be the case in my unit tests. Below is a snippet from the docs.

As the above examples show, in Uniswap V3, the two paired assets in a given pool are separated above and below the spot price, with the higher price asset available above the spot price and the lower-priced asset below.

https://docs.uniswap.org/concepts/protocol/range-orders

Calculating higher / lower tick spacing:

  const tickSpacing = await params.usdcWethPoolContract.tickSpacing();
  let tick = (await params.usdcWethPoolContract.slot0()).tick;
  let tickLower = tick - (tick % tickSpacing) + tickSpacing;
  let tickUpper = tickLower + tickSpacing;
  // raise tick 60 (30 bips spacing) * 10
  if (options.higherTick) {
    tickLower += tickSpacing * 10;
    tickUpper += tickSpacing * 10;
  }
  // lower tick 60 (30 bips spacing) * 10
  if (options.lowerTick) {
    tickLower -= tickSpacing * 10;
    tickUpper -= tickSpacing * 10;
  }

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Question

With that, why must I lower the tick range in order to provide single sided WETH if WETH is the higher priced token?

Further, why am I able to add only USDC at the current tick range as well as at a higher tick range and am unable to add only WETH at the current range?

When I try adding WETH at the current range or at a higher range I get a revert with no error emitted.

This was also helpful in understanding ticks and tick spacing: https://blog.uniswap.org/uniswap-v3-math-primer#ticks-vs-tickspacing

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Potential Answer

Is this perhaps because token0/1 is USDC/WETH and that an increase in a tick priced token1 / token0 would have an inverse correlation to the expected price?

So say the current ratio is 10 WETH - 1 USDC, an increase range would mean 20-1 and a decrease 5-1 let's say. So really lowering the tick range is expecting a stronger WETH price.

Answer 1

Summary

If providing liquidity in token 0, tickLower/tickUpper must be above current tick range.

If providing in token 1, tickLower/tickUpper must be below the current tick range.

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What are ticks

Ticks are a less precise form of sqrtPriceX96, thus they are also token1/token0.

It's about the price that provides the better execution for the asset.

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Arbitrum Example

For example on arbitrum you have USDC/WETH. Price is say $1850 (token1/token0), or price in token1 for 1 token 0.

The better price of this pool for USDC is 1800 because you provide less USDC for 1 WETH. 1800 is a lower tick range, a lower price.

Conversely if you sell 1 WETH for 1900 (high tick range) you're getting a better price than a lower tick range.

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Ethereum example

On Ethereum the pool is WETH/USDC, price is:

>>> sqrtPriceX96 = 1860250743572950558737581220524281
>>> decimal_token1 = 18
>>> decimal_token0 = 6
>>> round(sqrtPriceX96 * sqrtPriceX96 * ((10**decimal_token0) / (10**decimal_token1)) / (2 ** 192), decimal_token1)
0.00055129468580304 # price

0.00055129468580304` = 1 USDC.
>>> 0.00055129468580304 * 1814
1.0000485600467146

If providing liquidity in WETH (token1) you'll want a better price which is less WETH per USDC.

Conversely you want a higher price when providing liquidity in USDC. Said differently more WETH per USDC.

---

This helped a lot https://blog.uniswap.org/uniswap-v3-math-primer

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Tick from sqrtPriceX96

let tick = Math.floor(Math.log((sqrtPriceX96 / Q96) ** 2) / Math.log(1.0001));
let tickLower = tick - (tick % tickSpacing);
let tickUpper = tickLower + tickSpacing;

Current tick range:

const tickSpacing = await usdcWethPoolContract.tickSpacing();
let tick = (await usdcWethPoolContract.slot0()).tick;
let tickLower = tick - (tick % tickSpacing);
let tickUpper = tickLower + tickSpacing;