The ME Foundation has shared official tokenomics for $ME, the official upcoming token of Magic Eden, one of the most popular NFT trading marketplaces and launchpads around, including for web3 gaming. Here is everything revealed so far about their core token, which is set to have TGE take place in just a couple of weeks.
What Is the $ME Token?
The $ME token is an SPL token that was announced back in August 2024 and first adopted by Magic Eden to help the leading cross-chain trading platform achieve its vision of bringing digital ownership to everyone while becoming the go-to trading platform in which new and veteran crypto enthusiasts can easily trade all assets, including fungibles and NFTs, across all chains, in one place.
While the platform, according to the announcement, already has 80%+ volume share for Bitcoin Ordinals and Runes, and is the leading marketplace in the NFT world in which it takes up 60% share of revenue and a 29% share of users, the multi-chain ecosystem wants to bring crypto to the masses by creating a mobile-friendly dApp that makes it easier for new users to go onchain and start trading NFTs and cryptocurrencies across all blockchains.
To bring significant growth and onboard new users onchain, the $ME token is designed to be used as part of Magic Eden’s rewards program, where users are rewarded with $ME for trading assets on any chain. The other utilities are the ones you’d usually expect: by holding this token, you will have governance rights over “key protocol development direction,” while having the ability to contribute in some way to the ecosystem, as well as to dabble in staking to get more rewards.
Even though the token is launching using the SPL token standard, the non-profit foundation also wants it to have “broad appeal” across Solana, EVM, and Bitcoin, while having it represent the largest onchain economy and community.
Speaking of broad, Magic Eden is planning on revealing “the broadest onchain trading rewards program” soon. Info on this program will be shared after TGE, but the gist of it will revolve around trading assets to earn and stake $ME tokens.
With all that being said, let’s take a look at the official tokenomics!
What Are the $ME Tokenomics Like?
The tokenomics are said to be designed with long-term growth of the $ME ecosystem in mind. With a total supply of 1 billion, over half of it (502 million tokens) has been allocated to two community categories: the Initial $ME Claim (12.5%), and Community & Ecosystem (37.7%). The rest of the supply is reserved for Contributors (26.2%) and Strategic Participants.
The plan is to have the whole supply distributed over the course of 4 years. There will also be a Safety Council formed, where there will be 5 members with access to a multi-sig wallet. These members will be able to undertake “emergency and delayed non-emergency actions” to protect the community and open source protocols, which are also used by platforms such as OKX, Phantom, and Exodus, meaning they’re all part of the $ME ecosystem as well. Info on this council will be included in the ME DAO Constitution post-TGE, with governance documents for the Constitution and more to be published soon.
Here’s how each allocation works:
Initial $ME Claim
Eligible users across Solana, Bitcoin, and EVM networks will be able to fully claim an airdrop of $ME tokens on TGE, becoming “an integral part of $ME DAO.” Using the platform’s mobile dApp, users will be able to claim 100% of their airdrop allocation straight away on TGE. This means that a total of 125 million tokens will be fully claimable from the get-go, and anyone who is eligible will want to get their allocation as soon as possible, because if you don’t claim your allocation, it will then be transferred over to the staking pool in order to give more rewards to $ME stakers. An eligibility checker is planned to be released ahead of TGE.
Community & Ecosystem
The Community & Ecosystem category (37.7% of total supply) is divided into 2 parts, one of which has 22.5% of the supply reserved for rewarding active users. Most of this part will go towards the upcoming rewards program. As for the other part, which makes up the remaining 15.2%, that allocation is focused on supporting creators and anyone contributing to the growth and development of the ecosystem. Users will receive grants in the form of long-term agreements, while 5% of ecosystem development is reserved for the foundation’s treasury, set to be used for protocol support, “including amounts for liquidity provision.”
This category will be unlocked on TGE, but not fully. The exact percentage does not seem to have been stated, with the tokens emission schedule image showing the supply gradually unlocking over the course of 4 years.
Team & Investors
49.8% of the total supply is allocated to Contributors and Strategic Participants.
Contractors and advisors are said to fall under the Contributors category, and according to the official blog post, core contributors “representing >60% of the Contributor token bucket” will have their tokens locked for at least 18 months after TGE. As for Strategic Participants, this includes everyone who has given “critical guidance” for the development of the foundation’s protocols. For this allocation, there is a 12-month minimum lockup period post-TGE, after which the tokens will gradually unlock.
