Raydium’s RAY token surged about 36% in a Solana DEX trading spike after launchpad StonkFun moved its token deployments onto Raydium LaunchLab. Jupiter’s JUP gained 21% on the same news, Orca did not move, and SOL added under 2%. That split says more about the trade than the headline percentage does.
STONK Rose 250%, but RAY Captured Fees From Every Launch
StonkFun announced on Saturday that all new deployments would run through LaunchLab, citing cheaper deployment, less sniper risk and deeper liquidity after bonding. Its STONK token climbed more than 250% to around $0.16, touching a record $0.212, on a $140 million market cap.
Buying STONK is a bet on one launchpad staying popular. RAY captures fees from every token that graduates through LaunchLab, no matter who launched it. RAY trades at $1.14, and daily volume of $121.5 million against a $306 million market cap gives a turnover ratio near 40%.
What LaunchLab Is and Why Fees Reach RAY
LaunchLab is the token launchpad run by the Raydium Solana DEX, which has operated as an automated market maker since 2021. It arrived in April 2025, shortly after Pump.fun launched its own exchange. New tokens first trade against a bonding curve, and once a token hits a graduation threshold, its liquidity migrates into a Raydium pool.
Every graduated token then sends swap volume through Raydium’s pools, and Raydium directs 12% of its trading fees into open-market RAY buybacks. LaunchLab has hosted more than 35,000 launches and now earns around $900,000 a day in fees, ahead of Raydium’s swap revenue.
Why Orca DEX on Solana Did Not Move
Orca DEX on Solana is the chain’s other major automated market maker, and ORCA was flat to slightly lower while RAY ran. Jupiter’s JUP rose 21%, because Jupiter routes swaps into Raydium pools and earns from the flow.
Raydium and Jupiter sit in the path that new tokens take from creation to trading, and Orca does not, so it captured none of the activity. The gains landed on the protocols handling the launches, not on Solana DEXs generally.
Why SOL Gained Under 2% While RAY Ran 36%
SOL traded near $105, up about 2%. Launch activity generates fees for the applications that process it, not for the base layer, and Solana transaction fees stay below a cent, so millions of extra swaps barely register in SOL demand. Capital rotated into the protocols earning the revenue instead.
Read more: Solana Price Prediction
What the Pump.fun Era Says About Launch Cycles
Pump.fun still captured about 44% of Solana memecoin volume in August, and roughly 40% of the $143 million Solana apps earned that month, so launchpad revenue can persist for years rather than vanish after a fortnight.
Individual launches burn out much faster. Attention rotates to the next launchpad and the fee spike moves with it, which is why Raydium built LaunchLab rather than waiting for launches to arrive.
What RAY Traders Should Watch Next
RAY peaked above $1.30 on Saturday and trades at $1.14 now, down 12% in two days. The buyback program has removed 3.45 million RAY since July, but those buybacks are paid for out of fees, so they stop when the fees do.
Holding near $900,000 would mean StonkFun brought lasting flow, while a drop back toward the pre-integration level would mark this as a launch cycle rather than a shift in market share.
FAQs
Why did the Raydium RAY token jump?
RAY jumped about 36% because launchpad StonkFun moved all its new token deployments onto Raydium’s LaunchLab. Tokens launched there migrate into Raydium pools once they graduate, sending swap volume and fees through the protocol, and Raydium directs 12% of trading fees into buying back RAY.
What is Raydium LaunchLab?
Raydium LaunchLab is a token launchpad on Solana where new tokens first trade against a bonding curve before their liquidity moves into a Raydium pool. It launched in April 2025, has hosted more than 35,000 token launches, and now generates around $900,000 a day in fees.
Why did Orca DEX not rise with Raydium?
Orca has no launchpad, so none of the new token flow passed through it. Raydium hosts the launches and Jupiter routes swaps into Raydium pools, which is why RAY and JUP both gained while ORCA stayed flat.
Was the Raydium rally a Solana DEX trading spike or a sector recovery?
The Raydium rally was a launchpad trade rather than a sector-wide recovery. RAY and JUP rose because both sit in the path new tokens take to market, while ORCA stayed flat and SOL added under 2%, so the gains never spread across Solana DeFi.
