Fees and rewards
Lean, Standard and Creator+: what each fee preset charges, where the protocol fee goes, and how creators claim their reward.
On this page
Lean, Standard and Creator+
Lean charges 1% per trade and pays no creator reward. Standard charges 1.25%, of which 0.25% is the creator reward. Creator+ charges 1.5%, of which 0.5% is the creator reward. Every preset includes the same 1% protocol fee.
For example, on a $1,000 trade with Standard, the fee is $12.50: $2.50 to the creator and $10.00 to the protocol, of which $5.00 buys back and burns ALPHA.
Where the protocol fee goes
Half of the 1% protocol fee buys back and burns ALPHA. The other half goes to the protocol. On EVM chains both halves pass through a fixed splitter contract that can only send them to those two places, and a capped part of the protocol half first refills the keeper wallet that pays the network fees for price updates, graduations, buybacks and payouts. On Solana the program books each half to its own fixed account.
Creator rewards
The creator reward is 0% on Lean, 0.25% on Standard and 0.5% on Creator+, taken from every trade. It goes to the reward wallet chosen at launch, which is the creator’s wallet unless they picked another one, such as a team or cold wallet.
Only that wallet can claim the reward. Connect it to ALPHA and open Portfolio › Rewards to see what is claimable and claim it. The reward keeps accruing after graduation, because the pool charges the same fee on every swap. A reward too small to show as at least $0.01 is not offered for a claim, because its network fee would cost more than it pays.
How rewards are paid
On EVM chains, markets on the current ALPHA contracts pay the claim in the chain’s native coin (ETH, BNB, or USDC on Arc) in the same transaction, from any wallet. WETH and WBNB are unwrapped. Any other pairing asset is swapped to the native coin only when the swap returns at least 90% of its value at the oracle price; when there is no safe price or route, the claim pays the pairing asset itself. Markets launched on earlier ALPHA contracts pay the pairing asset, or the native coin when your wallet can confirm the claim and the conversion together.
On Solana, a WSOL market pays its reward in SOL. Other pairings pay the pairing asset, which you can swap to SOL in Portfolio.
Fixed at launch
The fee preset and the reward wallet are fixed when the token launches. Neither the creator nor ALPHA has any function to change them for that market. On EVM chains the market contracts cannot be upgraded, so a later change to ALPHA can only affect new launches.
Who can withdraw what
Only the reward wallet can claim the creator reward. Anyone can settle accrued fees, but settling only moves them to their fixed destinations. Money paid into the curve leaves only when someone sells tokens back. Nobody can withdraw the locked pool liquidity, and there is no admin function that redirects any of these amounts.
Network and pool fees
Network fees (gas) are paid to the chain, not to ALPHA, and are shown as an estimate before you sign. ALPHA charges no separate launch fee and no graduation fee. On Solana a launch also pays the rent of its new accounts, including the reserved Meteora pool, and the token-metadata fee. These go to the network and its programs, not to ALPHA, and the launch shows the SOL it needs before your wallet opens. After graduation on EVM chains, the Uniswap v4 pool has a 0% liquidity fee, so the ALPHA trading fee is the only pool fee. On Solana, markets graduate to a Meteora DAMM v2 pool with the same total fee as the preset: 1% on Lean, 1.25% on Standard and 1.5% on Creator+. Meteora keeps 20% of that fee (0.2%, 0.25% or 0.3%) as its own venue fee. The other 80% is split between the protocol and the creator in the ratio of the preset. The Meteora share goes to Meteora, not to ALPHA, and is shown separately in the review.
