Bonding Curve

Every token launched on Candle starts life on a bonding curve. Buyers trade against the curve itself rather than a liquidity pool, the price rises as supply sells, and once the curve raises its target the token graduates: liquidity migrates to a real DEX pool and the curve closes.

Curve terms below are stated in each curve’s own quote asset, never in dollars. A dollar figure needs a live SOL or ETH price, and a hardcoded one goes stale the day it is published.

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Launch modes

Every curve is one of two modes:

Mode	Who can buy pre-graduation
Exclusive	Wallets holding a Believer NFT only
Open	Anyone

Exclusive is the mechanism behind Candle’s thesis: the first buyers on a curve are wallets that have already demonstrated long hold behaviour, which gives a project a base of verified holders before it reaches the open market.

Gating is enforced on-chain by the curve program and re-checked server-side on every buy. It is not a UI restriction.

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Curve terms

There are nine configurations in the current launch matrix. Solana curves sell approximately 85%–85.37% of their initial supply by graduation; the Hood v2 configurations sell approximately 79.7%. They differ in chain, quote asset, gating, and how much they raise. A row describes a new curve created with that configuration; an existing curve keeps the immutable terms it was created with.

Solana

Config	Mode	Raise	Starting FDV	Graduation FDV	Supply sold
Gated SOL curve	Exclusive	190 SOL	58.89 SOL	1,900 SOL	~85%
Open SOL curve	Open	80 SOL	~24.8 SOL	~800 SOL	~85%
Gated USDC curve	Exclusive	14,000 USDC	4,339.26 USDC	138,215.41 USDC	~85.37%
Open USDC curve	Open	6,000 USDC	1,859.68 USDC	59,235.18 USDC	~85.37%
Open CNDL curve	Open	24,000,000 CNDL	7,438,736.84 CNDL	236,940,702.37 CNDL	~85.37%

The CNDL quote pair is open-only. Initial developer buys are bundled atomically for SOL-, USDC- and CNDL-quoted launches.

The quote asset is part of the deployed curve configuration, not a display preference. Changing it changes the threshold, decimal handling, and curve constants. Clients must use the configuration for the exact chain, quote asset, and launch tier.

Robinhood Chain (Hood)

The Hood rows below are the terms for the current launch-stack-v2 generation (live since block 63312133, 2026-09-15). Curves created by earlier generations keep their own immutable terms.

Config	Mode	Raise	Starting FDV	Graduation FDV	Initial supply sold
Gated ETH curve	Exclusive	10 ETH	3.32 ETH	105.76 ETH	~79.7%
Open ETH curve	Open	4 ETH	1.33 ETH	42.30 ETH	~79.7%
Gated USDG curve	Exclusive	34,000 USDG	11,288.79 USDG	359,573.81 USDG	~79.7%
Open USDG curve	Open	5,000 USDG	1,660.12 USDG	52,878.50 USDG	~79.7%

Hood curves are value-calibrated, not decimal-ported from Solana. A straight decimal port would have graduated at 190 ETH; instead, the native thresholds are fixed at 4 ETH and 10 ETH. Their dollar value floats with ETH and is not promised to remain at parity with a Solana threshold.

Note

Every figure in these tables is derived from the shipped source configuration by simulating the curve, and is regression-tested against the contracts so it cannot drift silently. FDV and supply-sold percentages use the initial 1,000,000,000-token minted supply as their denominator. The open SOL curve’s FDV figures are derived from the same scaling that sets its 80 SOL threshold.

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Hood v2 supply and fee accounting

Parameter	Value
Initial minted supply	1,000,000,000 tokens (1e24 raw)
Base-token decimals	15
Allocation to $CNDL stakers	0.5%–10% of initial supply (set by the launcher)
Physical curve balance at create	995,000,000 tokens at 0.5%; 900,000,000 at 10%
Ideal-path sold by graduation	approximately 79.6981% of initial supply
Seeded into the selected DEX	approximately 9.4556% of initial supply
Excess curve inventory	burned at graduation after the DEX seed is fixed
Curve transaction fee	1%, charged in quote on buys and sells
Migration fee	0

The staker allocation is chosen by whoever launches the token, within that range. It is transferred directly to the staking distributor when the token and curve are created, not held on the curve until graduation. That is why the curve starts with a range of 900M to 995M tokens rather than one fixed 900M inventory. It is what makes staking work like an index across the whole launchpad; see $CNDL.

The displayed raise is the net, accounted quote-reserve threshold. Because the 1% curve fee is accounted for separately, gross buyer input required to reach graduation is slightly greater than the displayed raise. At graduation, approximately 79.6981% of the initial supply has been sold on the ideal buy-only path, approximately 9.4556% is retained for the DEX seed, and the remaining curve inventory is burned. The exact sold amount can differ slightly after buy/sell round trips because integer rounding is path-dependent.

getReserves() on Hood

getReserves() is a compatibility view, not the pricing formula. It returns:

• quote: the accounted quote reserve used to measure progress toward graduation, in the quote asset’s smallest unit (wei for ETH; 6-decimal raw units for USDG). Direct quote donations do not increase it.
• base: the base token’s physical balance at the curve address, in 15-decimal raw units. Direct base-token transfers do increase it.

The base value includes inventory that may later seed the DEX or be burned, so it is not remaining purchasable output. Candle’s two-segment sqrt-price curve is not constant product: the two values are not x and y, there is no k to preserve, and multiplying them does not produce a Candle price.

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Graduation

When a curve reaches its raise target, curve trading closes and the graduation process initiates migration. On Hood, migrate() is a separate permissionless call on the curve; Candle’s keeper normally submits it, but anyone may do so. Where liquidity goes depends on the chain and, on Hood, the DEX version chosen at launch:

Graduation-crossing buys

The transaction that crosses the threshold behaves differently by chain. Integrators must quote the exact chain behavior.

• Hood: capped with refund. The curve consumes only the quote required to reach the threshold, calculates output from that capped amount, and returns the unused quote as the refund reported by the Bought event.
• Solana: full fill, no refund. The curve executes the entire submitted amount. Quote reserve above the threshold is treated as surplus under the pool configuration rather than refunded.

Solana → Meteora DAMM v2

• Pool trading fee: 0.5%, flat
• Fees are collected in the curve’s quote asset (SOL, USDC or CNDL)
• LP is locked at migration

Hood → Uniswap v3 or v4

• The developer selects Uniswap v3 or v4 when launching
• Static pool fee tier: 0.3%
• v3 uses WETH; v4 settles native ETH directly and uses the Candle launch hook
• The developer does not receive control of the migration liquidity
• Accrued LP fees and recovery behavior are handled by the selected migrator

The pre-graduation Hood market is a standalone Candle curve for both choices. Selecting v4 does not create or trade through a hooked Uniswap pool during the curve phase.

Hood migration and recovery timeline

Time after graduation	Who may enter recovery	What remains possible
Days 0–7	Nobody	Permissionless migrate() remains open; curve buys and sells are closed
Days 7–30	The launch creator only	migrate() remains open until recovery is entered
Day 30 onward	Anyone	migrate() remains open until recovery is entered

Entering recovery is irreversible and is separate from curve trading. It burns the curve’s remaining base inventory and lets holders surrender tokens for a fixed pro-rata share of the frozen graduation quote reserve. A non-creator holder of a stalled graduation may therefore have no exit for up to 30 days.

See Launch options and the chain-specific lifecycle pages for the current configuration and integration details.

Caution

Reaching graduation is not guaranteed. A curve that never reaches its raise target never migrates, and tokens bought on it remain tradeable only against the curve. Nothing about a bonding curve implies a token will hold value, gain value, or find a market after graduation. Read the Risk Disclosure Statement before trading.