How it works
Pons tokens start life on a bonding curve. Until the curve sells out, there's no Uniswap pool, so wallets, aggregators and bots that only speak Uniswap can't trade them. Lockkeeper fixes that.
The lock
For each curve token, Lockkeeper creates an ETH / token pool on Uniswap v4 with a hook attached. The pool holds no liquidity. When a swap arrives, the hook:
- takes your ETH (or tokens) from the Uniswap PoolManager,
- buys or sells on the Pons curve through the Pons adapter,
- hands the result back to Uniswap, which pays you out.
To Uniswap and your wallet it looks like a normal swap. The price you get is the curve price, minus Pons' fee and Lockkeeper's router fee.
Graduation
When the curve sells out, Pons moves the token to its regular pool. The Lockkeeper hook detects this and steps aside: from then on, trade the token on its regular pool with no router fee. We call this the gate opening.
Opening a lock
Anyone can open the lock for an eligible Pons V2 token. It costs only gas. The token's creator earns a share of every routed swap, whoever opened it.
What the hook checks on every swap
- The adapter isn't paused and the Pons contract code still matches what we reviewed.
- Your
minAmountOutand deadline, enforced inside the hook, whichever router sent the swap. - A per-block price-impact cap (5% during the beta), so one swap can't drain the curve.
- Exact-input swaps only. Exact-output is rejected.
- Launch protections: higher fees and a size cap for the first blocks after launch.
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