Pump.fun Overhauls Creator Fees to Curb Spam; $PUMP Jumps 10%
Alon breaks 65-day silence to deprecate ‘spam-incentivizing’ fee models as the protocol hits $6.6B in weekly volume.
Pump.fun founder Alon broke a 65-day silence to announce a critical pivot in the platform’s incentive structure, acknowledging that previous fee models inadvertently encouraged "low-risk" token spam over sustainable trading liquidity. The disclosure drove the platform’s native token, $PUMP, up 10% to $0.0024.
The Pivot to ‘High-Risk’ Trading
Effective immediately, the protocol has implemented Creator Fee Sharing, a mechanism allowing issuers to split revenue across up to 10 distinct wallets. Under the new system, creators and CTO (Community Takeover) admins can assign fee percentages post-launch, transfer ownership, and revoke update authorities directly via the Pump.fun interface.
The overhaul addresses a specific market failure: the platform’s "Dynamic Fees V1" model had made it profitable to deploy thousands of low-quality tokens regardless of their trading lifespan. Alon noted the discrepancy in a statement on X:
Creator fees may have skewed incentives toward low-risk coin creation instead of high-risk trading… traders are the lifeblood of the platform.
Volume vs. Value
Despite the structural flaws, the protocol’s raw metrics remain staggering. Pump.fun processed a record $6.6 billion in trading volume this week alone. Creator earnings topped $1.1 million in the last 24 hours, even as the "graduation rate" (tokens moving to Raydium) held below 1%.
The market responded favorably to the tightening of incentives. $PUMP reclaimed the $800 million market cap level, trading at $0.0024 (+10%), though it remains roughly 70% below its September 2025 highs.
Institutional Context
This shift signals a maturation phase for the Solana memecoin ecosystem. By prioritizing trading activity, the high-risk capital commitment, over mere token deployment, Pump.fun is attempting to filter out "dev spam" that dilutes liquidity. Future updates will reportedly introduce a market-based approach where traders, not the protocol, determine if a narrative justifies creator fees.
