Protocol Economics

Every Pair MarketPair MarketThe canonical pairing of an internet asset with a financial Pair: TOKEN × PAIR INSTRUMENT, plus the Pair Vault, configuration and accounting that connect them. earns from two sources. The first is the coin’s Pump creator-fee stream, which Pump pays on trading activity and which PairStreet splits three ways at launch. The second is the PairStreet trading fee, charged on trades that PairStreet builds. Both are live, both settle on-chain, and both are visible on the treasury account.

How the split is enforced on-chain

The split is a Pump fee-sharing config, written during the launch itself. The first launch transaction runs create_v2 together with create_fee_sharing_config, which makes the sharing-config PDA the bonding curve’s creator. The second transaction runs update_fee_shares with two shareholders. Both transactions are signed in the same single wallet prompt as the launch; Pump and Solana walks through the full sequence.

Pump lets a coin’s reward split be configured once. After update_fee_shares lands, the config is locked (adminRevoked = true) and nobody can change it, PairStreet included. Each coin has its own sharing config, keyed by its mint, so every lamport of creator fees is attributable to exactly one Pair Market.

Distribution is permissionless. Accrued creator fees are paid out by Pump’s distribute_creator_fees instruction, which anyone can trigger; the market page exposes it as “Distribute creator fees”. If the split transaction of a launch did not land, the market shows “Split pending” and the creator locks it later with “Lock fee split”. Both actions are served by GET and POST /api/markets/[mint]/fees, which return an unsigned transaction for the wallet to sign (see the API).

The 0.5% trading fee

PairStreet charges 0.5% of the SOL side of every trade it builds, on buys and on sells. The fee is a System transfer to the treasury inside the same transaction as the trade, so a trade and its fee land together or not at all.

• ·Buy. The fee is taken from the SOL going in. The remainder is what enters the bonding curve.
• ·Sell. The fee is taken from the SOL proceeds. The trader receives proceeds net of the fee.
• ·Pump fees are separate. Pump’s protocol fee and the coin’s creator fee are part of Pump’s curve math and apply on top of, not instead of, the PairStreet fee.
• ·Rent-minimum guard. A Solana account below its rent-exempt minimum cannot receive a transfer that leaves it underfunded. While the treasury account is below that minimum, a fee too small to fund it is skipped, so a trade never fails because of the fee.

Worked example

Three numbers that follow directly from the rates above.

Treasury

Both streams settle to one address, the PairStreet PairStreet treasuryPairStreet treasuryThe protocol wallet that receives the protocol share and Pair Vault reserve of creator fees plus the 0.5% trading fee.:

5XAwPtXHkA2F68tEj5ZAZePJfJWH4tzGkeQiqK5ggfRg

It is a single PairStreet-controlled wallet today. Moving it to a multisig is planned Planned. Every fee transfer and every creator-fee distribution into it is a public Solana transaction, readable on Solscan from the link above.

The Pair Vault reservePair Vault reserveThe 25% share of a Pair Market's creator fees earmarked for its Pair Vault. Held by the PairStreet treasury until the market's settlement route activates. is the 25% share of a market’s creator fees. It belongs to that market’s Pair. PairStreet earmarks it per Pair Market and holds it in the treasury until the market’s Pair VaultPair VaultThe account that receives settlement value allocated to one Pair Market, holds it until conversion, and holds the acquired Pair Asset until it is allocated to holders. custody and the instrument’s settlement route activate. At that point the reserve funds the Pair Vault, and the Pair Router converts it into the Pair Asset during settlement.

The accounting that keeps each market’s reserve separable, from creator-fee distribution to vault funding to settlement, is covered in Accounting and Reconciliation.

PairStreet runs two loops. The first belongs to each Pair Market: activity in the coin feeds its Pair. The second belongs to the protocol: activity across all markets feeds the treasury, and the treasury feeds integrations and, once launched, $STREET.

Pair Market flywheel

1. 01More launches bring more Pair Markets into the Pair Registry.
2. 02More trading generates more creator fees for each market.
3. 03More Pair economics: 25% of those creator fees accrue as the market’s Pair Vault reserve.
4. 04More Pair Asset acquisition once the instrument’s settlement route is active.
5. 05More holder utility: reward epochs allocate the acquired Pair Asset to eligible holders.
6. 06More interest in Pair Markets, and more creators launching them.

Protocol flywheel

1. 01More activity across all Pair Markets.
2. 02More protocol revenue: the 0.5% trading fee and the 25% protocol share of creator fees.
3. 03A larger protocol treasury.
4. 04Treasury-executed $STREET buybacks (planned).
5. 05Bought-back $STREET held in the treasury or burned, at treasury discretion (planned).
6. 06More Pair integrations: new providers, new instruments, new settlement routes.

Steps one to three of the protocol flywheel run today. The $STREET steps are planned protocol economics and activate with the token.

$STREET is the PairStreet protocol token. It has not launched yet and has no contract address. Planned

This is a description of how the treasury intends to use revenue. It makes no statement about the price of $STREET, and nothing on this page is a promise of value, yield or return to any holder.

The model below shows how the pieces relate. Move annual volume, the creator-fee rate, the share of revenue directed to buybacks and the share of bought-back $STREET burned; the outputs show protocol revenue, the buyback budget, the amount held and burned, and what remains for operations and integrations. The Pair Vault reserve is shown on its own line because it never enters the buyback budget.

The model assumes every trade is routed through PairStreet, which overstates trading-fee revenue for markets also traded elsewhere. The creator-fee rate is set by Pump per market and varies by curve and pool; the slider exists so the reader can test the relationship, not to predict it.

The path from activity to the treasury is live. What the treasury does next is set by policy, and the allocation between operations, integrations and buybacks is configurable rather than fixed in code.

For how protocol revenue relates to the reserve that funds each Pair, read Pair Vault. For the full trace of one market from launch to claim, with every number worked through, read the $TOKYO case study.