Tokenized attention: Pump.fun and the rise of Creator Capital Markets

The internet’s most valuable commodity is attention - and in 2025, that attention is becoming tokenized. Few projects embody this transformation more vividly than Pump.fun, a Solana-based platform that began as a meme-coin launchpad and has rapidly evolved into the infrastructure layer for Creator Capital Markets (CCM). Pump.fun represents a “0 to 1” moment for Web3 consumer apps: a system that converts virality into ownership and speculation into sustainable economic alignment.

Creator Capital Markets refer to the emerging financial systems that allow content creators, influencers, and streamers to tokenize their social presence, enabling fans and investors to own a share of their digital influence. In these markets, attention itself becomes a financial asset - creators issue tokens backed by content and likeness while fans gain tradable exposure to creators’ success. Pump.fun serves as the backbone of this model, linking social engagement with tokenized ownership to create an entirely new economy where culture, finance, and community converge.

From Meme Markets to Financialized Attention

Pump.fun’s early success stemmed from solving one of crypto’s oldest problems - access. By removing the technical barriers to token creation, anyone  can create a token on Solana within seconds using bonding-curve mechanics that lock liquidity and eliminate the risk of rug pulls. This simplicity unleashed an explosion of user activity: more than 10 million users, over 13 million tokens created including viral tokens such as FARTCOIN, and nearly $1 billion in cumulative revenue.

At first glance, this looked like another memecoin frenzy. In reality, it was a mass experiment in tokenized culture - a proof that users are willing to speculate on shared attention. Meme tokens became early expressions of value in the digital attention economy, functioning as financial primitives for culture. Each meme token captures a unit of collective engagement, and that engagement - if retained - becomes the foundation for recurring revenue and creator-led economies.

Pump’s Revenue Model

Unlike traditional social media platforms that monetize user engagement through advertisers, Pump.fun internalizes the economics of participation. The platform collects small fees on trades and token listings, with the majority of revenue directed toward buybacks that reinforce the value of its native PUMP token and incentive programs for token creators and streamers building on the platform. To date, Pump.fun has executed over $132 million in token buybacks, with roughly 95% of total revenue reinvested into these programs. This model transforms users from passive participants into stakeholders, creating a closed-loop system where attention drives fees, fees drive buybacks, and buybacks reinforce attention. It marks a clear transition from hype-based speculation to measurable on-chain cash flows, giving economic depth to what was once a purely narrative-driven market.

Enter the Creator Capital Markets

In early September, Pump.fun launched Project Ascend, formally introducing Creator Capital Markets (CCM) - a suite of tools that lets streamers and influencers tokenize their audiences. Each creator can issue a Streamer Token, whose value is linked to their social engagement and fan interaction. Fans buy tokens to support creators, effectively acquiring a micro-stake in their growth and success.

Early adoption has been strong. Various streamer tokens have reached into the 10s of millions of market cap, while creator engagement rose sharply after token issuance. As seen below, daily payouts are now in the millions rivaling models used by Twitch or Kick. The token structure aligns incentives - creators retain a large amount of the supply, ensuring that value accrues to those generating attention rather than platform intermediaries.

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For fans, this financialization of creators opens an entirely new dimension of participation. Instead of being passive viewers, fans become active economic stakeholders who share in the upside of a creator’s success. As creators gain popularity, token demand and value can rise, rewarding early supporters for identifying emerging talent. This creates a social-to-financial feedback loop where loyalty, engagement, and financial reward are intertwined - giving fans both emotional and economic incentives to help their favorite creators grow. Imagine being able to invest in your favorite YouTuber like MrBeast, or your favorite streamer or podcaster, during their early days - with Creator Capital Markets, that possibility now exists.

This framework effectively financializes fandom. Viewership becomes liquidity; popularity translates into yield. It redefines what it means to “support” a creator - no longer through one-time tips or ad views, but through ownership of tokenized attention. Pump.fun’s CCM is therefore not just another Web3 feature - it represents the tokenization of the $250 billion creator economy at scale.

Building the Everything Social App

Beyond token issuance, Pump.fun’s long-term roadmap positions it as an “everything social” app. The team plans to integrate streaming, social feeds, and tipping directly into its interface - creating an on-chain hybrid of YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and Twitch. Every user action, from posting to tipping to watching, will connect to token flows and wallet activity, linking social identity with economic participation.

In a world where attention is the ultimate scarce resource, this convergence creates a powerful moat. Pump.fun doesn’t just capture engagement - it monetizes and redistributes it. The same mechanisms that once powered meme speculation now underpin a sustainable, circular creator economy.

Investment and Market Implications

For investors, the rise of creator capital markets represents the next frontier after DeFi and tokenization - the tokenization of human capital. Platforms like Pump.fun enable both retail and institutional investors to gain exposure to cultural production, transforming creators into investable assets.

If successful, this model could extend to music, gaming, sports, and beyond - where tokens represent fractional ownership of influence, intellectual property, or digital revenue streams. It’s a high-beta bet on the financialization of creativity itself.

The risks remain real - from regulatory scrutiny to speculative over-saturation - but the trajectory is clear: attention has become an asset class, and Pump.fun is building the rails for its exchange.