Pump.fun’s Creator Fee Model Signals a New Phase for Solana’s Meme Economy
The meme token gold rush on Solana just took a sharp turn toward sustainability. On May 9, 2025, Pump.fun — the viral token launchpad that’s dominated Solana activity in recent months — announced a new revenue-sharing model that gives creators a cut of trading fees. It’s the first time creators of memecoins can earn ongoing income from the frenzy they ignite.
From Chaos to Cash Flow
Pump.fun has exploded in popularity by making it frictionless to deploy and trade meme tokens on Solana. Anyone can launch a token in minutes, with an embedded bonding curve and automatic liquidity — no dev skills or VC funding needed.
The problem? Most of those tokens were short-lived cash grabs. Creators had no incentive to maintain projects once initial hype faded. Now, that’s changing.
Under the new model, 50% of trading fees on Pump.fun’s native swap platform, PumpSwap, will go directly to token creators. That translates to 0.05% of each trade involving their token — paid automatically in SOL. Even tokens that have left the initial bonding curve and are trading freely on PumpSwap still generate income for their original deployers.
Numbers That Matter
To understand the impact, consider the recent stats. Pump.fun reported a staggering $14.6 billion in total trading volume in April alone. Had the revenue-sharing model been in place then, over $7.3 million would have gone directly into the wallets of token creators.
And this isn’t theoretical. Within 24 hours of the launch, creators had already earned over $60,000 collectively, according to the official Pump.fun account on X.
This model has the potential to turn serial token creation into a new kind of recurring income stream — one with radically low barriers to entry. It also adds an unusual twist to Web3 economics: creators can now profit without selling or promoting their own token, simply by letting the market do what it does best — speculate.
A Fragile Incentive Shift
Whether this shift will improve the quality of memecoins remains to be seen. Critics argue that even with shared fees, the dominant incentive is still short-term — push volume, cash out, and move on. But others see it as a meaningful upgrade over the zero-alignment model that previously defined meme launches.
At minimum, it reduces the temptation to hard-rug or abandon a project immediately after launch. For high-volume tokens, passive income from ongoing trading can outweigh any single pump-and-dump. The platform is effectively paying creators to not kill their coins too soon.
There’s also a reputational angle. As revenue streams build over time, creator identity and brand may become more important — leading to better-designed tokens, repeat builders, and possibly even emergent communities around the most active creators.
Still Mostly Anonymous
But don’t mistake this for professionalism. Pump.fun is still very much the Wild West. Token names like “goblinfart,” “chadscam,” and “elonpepe420” are the norm, and few (if any) creators use real identities. The tools are simple, the UI gamified, and the culture intentionally irreverent.
What’s different now is that the incentives are finally layered. It’s no longer just about grabbing attention on X or Discord for a 10-minute sprint to liquidity. Volume now has recurring value. Builders can stick around without needing to manually monetize via presales or influencer grifts.
The Bigger Context: Solana as the Meme Layer
Zooming out, this move is part of a broader story: Solana is becoming the de facto chain for speculative memecoins. With sub-cent transaction fees and high throughput, it’s optimized for the kind of fast-paced trading that memecoins thrive on.
Platforms like Pump.fun have weaponized this dynamic. Instead of waiting weeks to deploy an ERC-20 and praying for a centralized exchange listing, users can launch a coin, trade it, and (in some cases) walk away with thousands — all in under an hour.
The addition of creator fees now gives the ecosystem a flywheel effect. More creators → more tokens → more trades → more earnings → more creators. If Solana was already the “retail casino” of crypto, this just added slot machines that pay both ways.
Risks and Realities
Still, the model doesn’t fix fundamental risks. Most Pump.fun tokens are worthless within hours. Liquidity is thin. Community management is non-existent. For every token that reaches meme escape velocity, hundreds fade into obscurity — often leaving retail buyers holding the bag.
There’s also an open regulatory question. While revenue-sharing in DeFi is common, the U.S. SEC has previously treated such models as potential securities offerings. Whether that logic extends to pseudonymous meme token deployers remains unclear — but history suggests regulators will eventually take interest if the numbers keep climbing.
The Takeaway
Pump.fun’s move to pay memecoin creators from trading fees marks a key evolution in crypto’s lowbrow, high-volume corner. It may not cleanse the space of scams or volatility, but it creates a longer-term incentive for builders to stick around — and potentially develop reputations. Whether this leads to better projects or just better scams, one thing is clear: the meme economy now has recurring revenue.
— John van Rijck, Analyst at AllCryptoWhitepapers.com