diff --git a/electrum/contrib/base.sh b/electrum/contrib/base.sh
--- a/electrum/contrib/base.sh
+++ b/electrum/contrib/base.sh
@@ -300,8 +300,3 @@
 
 # This variable is set to avoid sourcing base.sh multiple times
 export _BASE_SH_SOURCED=1
-
-function get_electrum_version()
-{
-    grep ^VERSION_TUPLE ${ELECTRUM_ROOT}/electrumabc/version.py | sed 's/.*(\([0-9, ]*\))/\1/' | sed 's/, /./g'
-}
diff --git a/electrum/contrib/build-linux/appimage/_build.sh b/electrum/contrib/build-linux/appimage/_build.sh
--- a/electrum/contrib/build-linux/appimage/_build.sh
+++ b/electrum/contrib/build-linux/appimage/_build.sh
@@ -16,8 +16,6 @@
 # pinned versions
 PKG2APPIMAGE_COMMIT="eb8f3acdd9f11ab19b78f5cb15daa772367daf15"
 
-APPIMAGE="$DISTDIR/$PACKAGE-${ELECTRUM_VERSION}-x86_64.AppImage"
-
 rm -rf "$BUILDDIR"
 mkdir -p "$APPDIR" "$CACHEDIR" "$DISTDIR"
 
@@ -101,6 +99,10 @@
 "$python" -m pip install --no-deps --no-warn-script-location --no-binary :all: --only-binary hidapi --cache-dir "$CACHEDIR/pip_cache" -r "$CONTRIB/deterministic-build/requirements-hw.txt"
 
 "$python" -m pip install --no-deps --no-warn-script-location --cache-dir "$CACHEDIR/pip_cache" "${ELECTRUM_ROOT}"
+
+# setup.py depends on the build tools (setuptools), so get the version before uninstalling them
+ELECTRUM_VERSION=$($python ${ELECTRUM_ROOT}/setup.py --version)
+
 "$python" -m pip uninstall -y -r "$CONTRIB/requirements/requirements-build-uninstall.txt"
 
 
@@ -217,6 +219,8 @@
 "$BUILDDIR/squashfs-root/usr/lib/appimagekit/mksquashfs_orig" \$args
 EOF
     chmod +x "$BUILDDIR/squashfs-root/usr/lib/appimagekit/mksquashfs"
+
+    APPIMAGE="$DISTDIR/$PACKAGE-${ELECTRUM_VERSION}-x86_64.AppImage"
     env VERSION="${ELECTRUM_VERSION}" ARCH=x86_64 ./squashfs-root/AppRun --no-appstream --verbose "$APPDIR" "$APPIMAGE" \
                 || fail "AppRun failed"
 ) || fail "Could not create the AppImage"
diff --git a/electrum/contrib/build-linux/appimage/build.sh b/electrum/contrib/build-linux/appimage/build.sh
--- a/electrum/contrib/build-linux/appimage/build.sh
+++ b/electrum/contrib/build-linux/appimage/build.sh
@@ -44,7 +44,6 @@
     -e HOME="$MAPPED_DIR/contrib/build-linux/appimage/home" \
     -e BUILD_DEBUG="$BUILD_DEBUG" \
     -e ELECTRUM_ROOT=${MAPPED_DIR} \
-    -e ELECTRUM_VERSION=$(get_electrum_version) \
     --name $CONTAINERNAME \
     -v ${ELECTRUM_ROOT}:$MAPPED_DIR:delegated \
     --rm \
diff --git a/electrum/contrib/build-wine/_build.sh b/electrum/contrib/build-wine/_build.sh
--- a/electrum/contrib/build-wine/_build.sh
+++ b/electrum/contrib/build-wine/_build.sh
@@ -207,9 +207,9 @@
         done
         popd_pkg
 
-
         pushd "$here"/../..  # go to top level
 
+        ELECTRUM_VERSION=$($PYTHON ${ELECTRUM_ROOT}/setup.py --version | tr -d '\r')
         info "Version to release: ${ELECTRUM_VERSION}"
         info "Fudging timestamps on all files for determinism ..."
         find -exec touch -d '2000-11-11T11:11:11+00:00' {} +
diff --git a/electrum/contrib/build-wine/build.sh b/electrum/contrib/build-wine/build.sh
--- a/electrum/contrib/build-wine/build.sh
+++ b/electrum/contrib/build-wine/build.sh
@@ -55,7 +55,6 @@
     -u $USER_ID:$GROUP_ID \
     -e HOME=/homedir \
     -e ELECTRUM_ROOT=${MAPPED_DIR} \
-    -e ELECTRUM_VERSION=$(get_electrum_version) \
     -e GIT_COMMIT_HASH=$(git rev-parse HEAD) \
     -e WIN_ARCH="$WIN_ARCH" \
     -e BUILD_DEBUG="$BUILD_DEBUG" \
diff --git a/electrum/contrib/osx/make_osx b/electrum/contrib/osx/make_osx
--- a/electrum/contrib/osx/make_osx
+++ b/electrum/contrib/osx/make_osx
@@ -51,7 +51,7 @@
 
 cd "$build_dir/../.."
 
-VERSION=`git describe --tags`
+VERSION=$(python3 ${ELECTRUM_ROOT}/setup.py --version)
 GIT_COMMIT_HASH=$(git rev-parse HEAD)
 
 # Paramterize
diff --git a/electrum/setup.py b/electrum/setup.py
--- a/electrum/setup.py
+++ b/electrum/setup.py
@@ -11,25 +11,28 @@
 import setuptools.command.sdist
 from setuptools import setup
 
-with open("README.md", "r", encoding="utf-8") as f:
+ELECTRUM_ROOT = os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__))
+REQUIREMENTS_DIR = os.path.join(ELECTRUM_ROOT, "contrib", "requirements")
+
+with open(os.path.join(ELECTRUM_ROOT, "README.md"), "r", encoding="utf-8") as f:
     long_description = f.read()
 
-with open("contrib/requirements/requirements.txt", encoding="utf-8") as f:
+with open(os.path.join(REQUIREMENTS_DIR, "requirements.txt"), encoding="utf-8") as f:
     requirements = f.read().splitlines()
 
-with open("contrib/requirements/requirements-hw.txt", encoding="utf-8") as f:
+with open(os.path.join(REQUIREMENTS_DIR, "requirements-hw.txt"), encoding="utf-8") as f:
     requirements_hw = f.read().splitlines()
 
-with open("contrib/requirements/requirements-binaries.txt", encoding="utf-8") as f:
+with open(
+    os.path.join(REQUIREMENTS_DIR, "requirements-binaries.txt"), encoding="utf-8"
+) as f:
     requirements_binaries = f.read().splitlines()
 
 # We use this convoluted way of importing version.py and constants.py
 # because the setup.py scripts tends to be called with python option
 # -O, which is not allowed for electrumabc (see comment in module
 # electrumabc/bitcoin.py). A regular import would trigger this issue.
-dirname = os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__))
-ec_package_dirname = os.path.join(dirname, "electrumabc")
-sys.path.insert(0, ec_package_dirname)
+sys.path.insert(0, os.path.join(ELECTRUM_ROOT, "electrumabc"))
 
 
 def get_version():