September is the best month of the year.

Written by: Rhythm

In a non-repurchase narrative, Meteora took the first step, and the market is quite positive about this new thing called DLMM Pro, with MET rising 50% in a single day.

Meteora is one of the largest liquidity pool players on the Solana chain, aiming to solve the long-standing pain points of the Solana liquidity pool platform with DLMM Pro.

Now, launching new coins on Solana is done in two phases.

In the first phase, an automatic price increase mechanism is set up. At first, the coins are cheap, and as more people buy, the price increases, which is called a bonding curve. Once the price reaches a certain level, it is considered "graduated."

In the second phase, the booth is taken down, and the remaining coins and money are moved to a real liquidity pool to start over.

However, moving the pool comes with many issues.

Just like moving houses makes it hard for others to find you, after moving the pool, the websites that help you find the cheapest prices will have to re-route, the original money cannot be reused in the same way, and the team cannot launch the coins as they envisioned.

The rules on Solana are generally like this. After graduation, the coins from Pump.fun move to PumpSwap. Raydium is the stop at the other end of this road, where coins graduated from other platforms move into Raydium’s pool, which also has its own issuance tools. Meteora's own DBC follows the same rule; once the price is reached, it has to move.

What DLMM Pro wants to do is to avoid moving houses

The new tool aims to keep the coin issuance process in one pool from start to finish.

First, the team decides how to allocate money when launching. Whether to stabilize the price first or to push it high initially is up to them.

Second, transaction fees can start high; as more people engage with the coin and the price stabilizes, it can slowly decrease. Newly issued coins are the most volatile, with the pool money exposed to losses; therefore, charging more during that period serves as a risk cushion. Once stabilized, lowering the price helps retain traders.

Third, there’s no need to move. One pool is used from issuance to maturity.

There are a few supporting features. Each investor receives a "certificate," similar to a property title, which can be transferred, combined into a single certificate, or entrusted to others for management. Those who want to place limit orders can directly set them in the same pool, and after transactions, the money continues to earn fees. It is said that costs will decrease, but this will only be clear after the features go live and are experienced.

This design is not unique to Meteora. For example, the issuance platform Bankr on Base uses this setting, which means its pool never moves, and the fees consistently flow to the creators.

September is the best month of the year

MET's soaring is not just due to the new product.

According to DefiLlama data, Meteora's fee income over the last three months was 12.21 million USD in July, 16.19 million in August, and 31.43 million in September, an increase of 94% compared to August, almost doubling.

Looking at the trading volume, July’s trading volume was 3.84 billion USD, August was 4.67 billion, and September was 6.90 billion, a 48% increase from August.

The trading volume in September was 48% higher than in August, but the fees increased by 94%. The fee increase outpaced the trading volume by double.

Why? Because Meteora's fees are dynamic. Unlike other pools that charge a fixed percentage, the more volatile the price, the more fees are generated. September saw significant market fluctuations; people still had to buy and sell, allowing the same trading volume to generate more fees. This is the core mechanism for Meteora’s profitability and distinguishes it from other pools.

The increase in types of products traded is also a reason for the strong September data.

According to updates from Meteora's official documentation, since September 9, its issuance tool has supported stock tokens. Stock tokens, real-world assets, and other types of new tokens can all become part of the pool.

This step is crucial. Previously, these pools only served newly issued coins; now any assets can come in for trading.

This segment also hit its own record in September. The issuance curve pool (DBC) is one of the product lines catering to these types of assets; let's look at its changes over three months.

Taking July as 100, the DBC in September was at 142, marking a three-month high. Interestingly, it first dropped to 65 in August, being the only product line to shrink that month. After supporting stock tokens on September 9, it caught up.

Stocks are different from those new coins. Stocks only open for trading at a fixed time each day, and their prices are not as volatile. Liquidity pools dealing with stocks require tools that can set price ranges very narrowly and manage the accounts very clearly. The three switches of DLMM Pro are just for this purpose.

Repurchases are not yet in place

The only clear way for MET holders to receive dividends now is through the recommended staking that went live on July 21. This involves converting part of the DLMM fees into USDC, which is distributed to stakers and those who recommend others to stake.

The first round ended at the end of August, with 76 million MET staked, distributing 336,000 USD. The second round ended on September 21, with 89 million MET staked, distributing over 700,000 USD.

Another matter is the repurchase. This means the project team uses funds to buy back MET from the market.

Meteora spent 1 million USD in the first quarter, buying back about 7 million coins at an average price of $0.1427. Up to now, they have cumulatively invested 13.67 million USD, accounting for 3.97% of the total supply. However, the coins bought back are held and not destroyed. The semi-annual report and the community call in August did not mention repurchases, and it is highly likely that none were made in the second quarter.

So the current situation is that while fees have increased and payouts to stakers have also risen, there is no mechanism in place to automatically link these two matters to the price of MET. Whether or not to buy back and how much to distribute are entirely at the discretion of the project team.