  Maximal Extractable Value (MEV) has garnered significant attention in the
cryptocurrency community. Such attention is a consequence of the revenue that
can be generated from MEV, as well as the risks MEV poses to the fundamental
value proposition of the underlying blockchain technology. In this work, we
provide an information-theoretic formulation of MEV. With this formulation, we
make common statements about MEV mathematically rigorous. For example, we show
that i) all non-trivial blockchains and decentralised applications must
generate MEV; ii) how MEV can be reduced at the expense of user expressibility;
and iii) how MEV can be good or bad from an information theoretic standpoint.
