percolatorpump

abstract

percolatorpump is a Solana-native perpetuals protocol that uses the traded memecoin itself as collateral. It removes the dependency on stablecoins and wraps the full trading lifecycle into a single token, lowering the barrier for memecoin communities to access leveraged exposure.

The protocol builds on the Percolator engine, an open-source perpetuals core designed by Anatoly Yakovenko. It adds a permissionless listing layer, a phased deployment model funded by a public treasury, and a seeded market strategy that ensures liquidity on Day 1.

1. the problem

Solana's memecoin ecosystem moves fast. New tokens launch daily, run up on volume, and attract traders looking for leveraged exposure. But existing perpetuals protocols require stablecoin collateral (USDC, USDT) and centralized listing processes. By the time a token gets a perp market on a traditional venue, the opportunity window has closed.

Memecoin traders don't hold stablecoins. They hold the token. Requiring them to sell their position into USDC just to open a leveraged trade on the same token is friction that kills participation.

There is also a supply-side problem. Listing a new perp market on existing protocols requires governance proposals, risk committee approval, and oracle integrations that take weeks. The memecoin market operates on a timescale of hours.

2. the core insight

If the collateral is the token itself, every token with a DEX trading pool already has everything it needs for a perpetuals market. No stablecoin bridging. No governance vote. No oracle committee. Just a price feed from an existing AMM pool and an engine that can manage risk in token-denominated terms.

The Percolator engine was designed for exactly this model. Its haircut-based socialization mechanism handles the case where the vault's token balance is insufficient to cover all profitable positions. Instead of cascading liquidations or insurance fund depletion, the engine proportionally reduces withdrawals. This makes the system resilient to the extreme volatility that defines memecoins.

3. the percolator engine

The Percolator is an open-source perpetuals engine originally authored by Anatoly Yakovenko (Toly), co-founder of Solana. percolatorpump deploys a compact variant of this engine optimized for the memecoin use case.

Each market is a single on-chain account called a slab (~100 KB, ~0.7 SOL rent). A slab contains the full order book, position state, funding accumulators, and risk parameters for one token. There is no shared state between markets. Each slab is self-contained.

4. protocol architecture

percolatorpump is deployed as three on-chain programs on Solana:

• 1.Percolator Program: the trading engine. Handles all position lifecycle operations (deposit, withdraw, place order, liquidate, crank). Each market is a separate slab account owned by this program.
• 2.Oracle Program: reads DEX pool prices and writes them to a feed account with a slot-stamped update. The trading engine reads this feed at order time.
• 3.Keeper Bot: an off-chain service that cranks funding, processes ADL transitions, triggers liquidations, and garbage-collects settled positions. Runs permissionlessly.

The frontend is a Next.js application that builds and submits transactions client-side. No custody, no intermediary. The wallet signs every transaction directly.

5. phased deployment

The protocol launches in two phases, tied to a public treasury balance.

This model aligns incentives. Early participants fund the deployment through launches. The treasury threshold is public and verifiable on-chain. No private raises, no token sale, no governance vote to ship.

6. permissionless listing

Any SPL token with an active DEX trading pool can be listed as a leverage market. The listing flow is fully on-chain and atomic: the lister allocates a slab, initializes the engine with default risk parameters, creates the vault, and deposits initial liquidity in a single transaction.

The lister becomes the initial liquidity provider. Their deposit seeds the vault so trading can begin immediately. There is no minimum listing size. The market is permanent once created. Slabs cannot be deleted.

This means the market can keep up with the memecoin cycle. A token that starts trending at 9 AM can have a leverage market by 9:01 AM.

7. risk model

Maximum leverage is 10x. Initial margin is notional / leverage. Maintenance margin is set per-market in the risk parameters (default: configurable basis points).

Liquidation triggers when an account's capital falls below the maintenance margin requirement. The liquidator receives a fee (capped, with a minimum floor) from the liquidated position. This fee structure incentivizes prompt liquidation without enabling predatory behavior.

The haircut system means the protocol does not rely on an insurance fund to remain solvent. When losses exceed the insurance fund, the h factor degrades smoothly rather than triggering a cascading failure. Profitable traders receive a proportional reduction rather than a total loss.

This design is deliberately conservative for memecoin markets, where 50%+ drawdowns in minutes are normal. The engine was built for this volatility profile.

8. memecoin-as-collateral

In traditional perps, you deposit USDC to trade BTC. On percolatorpump, you deposit WIF to trade WIF. The collateral and the traded asset are the same token.

This creates a reflexive dynamic: as a token's price rises, existing long positions become more valuable in USD terms even though their token-denominated collateral stays the same. The engine manages this through continuous mark-to-market against the oracle price.

For traders, this means zero friction. You hold the token, you trade the token, you settle in the token. No stablecoin step. For communities, it means their token gets a fully functional derivatives market without any external dependencies.

9. conclusion

percolatorpump combines Toly's Percolator engine with a permissionless listing layer and a memecoin-native collateral model to create a perpetuals protocol that matches the speed and culture of the Solana memecoin ecosystem.

The phased deployment ensures the protocol ships only when funded. The seeded market strategy ensures liquidity exists on Day 1. The permissionless listing flow ensures any token can have a market within seconds.

The result is a protocol where the memecoin is your collateral, the market is one transaction away, and leverage is available to anyone with a wallet.