Solana decentralized exchange Raydium says it’s going live in the next week with its “flexible” token launchpad, which will address what have become user pain points on its soon-to-be competitor Pump.fun.

The new platform, LaunchLab, will allow users to adjust a token’s bonding curve and tokenomics, while still offering a user-friendly cookie cutter option.

Previously, Raydium had simply operated as an automated market maker and decentralized exchange on Solana; while Pump.fun rapidly grew to become the most popular token launchpad due to its quick and easy experience.

When tokens reached a certain market cap on Pump.fun, they used to “graduate” to Raydium. Doing so allowed for tokens to be more freely and widely traded. However, last week, Pump.fun split off from Raydium and began graduating tokens to PumpSwap, its own decentralized exchange.

Tom, the pseudonymous team lead at Raydium, told Decrypt that he had a “gut feeling” Pump.fun was going to make a move like this and had been preparing for it for “a couple of months,” by creating a rival launchpad in LaunchLab.

“The program that we have right now offers a lot of flexibility for token creators,” Tom explained. “The vast majority of asset issuance in the future is going to happen on Solana, and we want Raydium to play a central role in that.”

LaunchLab is set to offer a wide range of parameters that users can adjust for their token launch. These include the total token supply, vesting schedules, which liquidity pool to utilize, as well as various ways to manipulate the “bonding curve”—which is used to generate liquidity for a token before it launches for wider distribution.

In fact, Raydium is even toying with the idea of being able to manually drag the bonding curve on its X and Y access, in turn impacting several factors relating to the token. Tom says this would display the power of the tool the team is creating, but he is unsure if the feature will ship straight away.

This is a stark difference to Pump.fun which only allows users to make aesthetic changes to tokens, giving everything the same tokenomics and bonding curve. And, in many ways, this simplicity has been to the benefit of the platform as traders know exactly what they’re getting into when buying a Pump.fun token.

However, Raydium thinks it’s time to evolve.

“We’ve talked to hundreds of teams this year, especially on the AI token side, where they initially launched their token on Pump.fun, and then they realized they didn’t have the amount of funding that they needed to deliver on their goals,” Tom explained. “So I think that people will view the optionality of [LaunchLab] as being a net benefit, but it might take some time to play out.”

Pump.fun has seen a wave of AI projects either endorse or create a token on the launchpad as a way to fund development. However, a common pain point is the lack of control the team has over the token.

This can result in “tremendous energy” that is “difficult to sustain” due to a lack of capital, Ooli, the creator of AI With Daddy Issues, previously told Decrypt.

Tom said that despite Pump.fun’s surge in popularity, there is still “considerable friction” for projects looking to create bespoke tokens. Over the past year, the Raydium team has been troubleshooting for a number of projects that wanted to launch tokens that didn’t suit Pump.fun’s simplified approach, in part prompting the creation of a more complex launchpad to address this.

Although there is optional flexibility with LaunchLab’s token creation process, it will still aim to provide a retail and user-friendly experience. The user interface itself will “look and feel” similar to Pump.fun and provide a cookie cutter token option—if the user isn’t keen on adjusting its parameters.

“I would like to see teams benefit from the flexibility of the program, I think a couple of strong launches does a lot to really show this,” Tom told Decrypt. “I would like to see users make money and tokens increase in price in a way that is sustainable, [which will] lead to more migrations and trading throughout Solana.”

LaunchLab is set to be part of a broader suite of products by Raydium, with the first tool being the aforementioned token launchpad. Currently, the team is considering which features to go live with and which to hold back. Tom also said Raydium is talking to third parties about implementing LaunchLab into their products, as well as creating a “liquidity bootstrapping” feature somewhat akin to the pre-sale model.

“I think all products have a phase one which is: You get it out there, you throw something at the wall and you see what sticks.” he said. “And if you’re not seeing a lot of stuff stick, you pick it back up, you re-bundle it, and you throw it again.”

Tom told Decrypt that he’s ready to push LaunchLab as early as Wednesday, but is holding back to think through how the product can make the biggest splash. Adding that it will definitely be shipped “within the next week.”

“But I can say that fees will be less and the idea is to have [LaunchLab] be positive long-term for the space,” he added.

Edited by Stacy Elliott.

Crypto observers were speculating on Monday that World Liberty Financial (WLFI), the decentralized finance (DeFi) platform backed by U.S. President Donald Trump and his family, might be testing its long-awaited dollar stablecoin before rolling out for the broader public.

Blockchain sleuths earlier today noted a flurry of activity with a token labeled as World Liberty Financial USD (USD1) on blockchain monitoring websites Etherscan and BscScan. Blockchain data shows that USD1 was deployed earlier this month on the Ethereum and BNB Chain networks and series of transactions with the token occurring over the past couple weeks.

Some transfers included addresses linked to Wintermute, a large digital asset trading firm and market maker, and crypto custodian BitGo, according to Arkham Intelligence data. The token’s supply currently stood at around 3.5 million-3.5 million on Ethereum and BNB Chain, per Etherscan and BscScan.

Changpeng CZ Zhao, founder of crypto exchange giant Binance, brought widespread attention to the token by “welcoming” the project on BNB Chain in a post with a screenshot of the USD1 BscScan profile shared with his 10 million followers. The post, he later said, triggered a wave of copy-cats aiming to capitalize on the new-found attention.

WLFI, reacting in a X post, said USD1 is not currently available for trading and crypto users should beware of scams.

Stablecoin buzz

WLFI, a project spearheaded by Zachary Folkman and Chase Herro, made a splash last year as one of the first crypto projects enjoying the backing of Trump. The protocol aims to provide a blockchain-based marketplace where users can borrow and lend cryptocurrencies, create liquidity pools and transact with stablecoins.

It’s been widely known that the project is working on crafting its own stablecoin, but there hasn’t been any official communication about exact plans and timing of launching the token publicly. CoinDesk has reached out to the team, but hasn’t received any replies.

Stablecoins are one of the fastest-growing corners of the crypto industry and widely regarded as the killer use case for blockchains. With their prices pegged to an external asset, predominantly to the U.S. dollar, they are widely used as a crypto trading pair and transactions on blockchain rails. They are also increasingly used for everyday payments, remittances and savings, attracting the attention of many venture capital investors.

Buzz around the asset class rejuvenated over the past months as the Trump administration elevated stablecoin regulation to the top of its crypto agenda. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said that stablecoins have a key role in preserving the U.S. dollar’s global role as a reserve currency.

The German financial supervisory authority BaFin said it identified “serious deficiencies” in Ethena’s USDe token, which the company calls a synthetic dollar, and forbade the issuer from offering it to the public with immediate effect.

The European Union’s Market in Crypto Assets (MiCA) regulations for issuers of stablecoins, tokens whose value is tied to another asset, took effect on June 30 last year. Ethena GmbH has been issuing USDe since June 28, according to BaFin. Companies were allowed to continue issuing their tokens while applying for a MiCA license, unless ordered to stop.

“During the ongoing licensing process, BaFin has identified, among other things, serious deficiencies in the bank’s business organization and violations of MiCAR requirements, such as those regarding asset reserves and compliance with capital requirements,” the regulator said.

USDe counts as an asset-referenced token because it is “a crypto asset whose value stability is to be maintained by reference to other assets, rights, or currencies,” BaFin said.

Ethena is the yield-generating protocol that markets the $5.4 billion token as a “synthetic dollar” with its price anchored at $1. The token uses cryptocurrencies including bitcoin (BTC) and ether (ETH) as backing assets, pairing them with an equal value of short perpetual futures positions on various exchanges.

The strategy generates income for the protocol when perpetual funding rates are positive and passes on some of the income as yield to those who stake USDe (sUSDe). The protocol also issues the USDtb stablecoin, backed by BlackRock’s tokenized Treasury bill fund.

“BaFin also has reasonable grounds to suspect that Ethena GmbH is publicly offering securities in Germany in the form of ‘sUSDe’ tokens of Ethena OpCo. Ltd. without the required securities prospectus,” the regulator said.

Ethena said on X that it will “continue to evaluate alternative frameworks,” after being notified that the “application under the MiCAR regulatory framework will not be approved.”

Ethena’s governance token, ENA, had dropped 6.5% in the past 24 hours, extending losses following the announcement, according to CoinMarketCap data.

Krisztian Sandor contributed to this article.

UPDATE (March 21, 16:37 UTC): Adds MiCA in second paragraph, regulator quote in third, USDe explanation starting in fifth.