RIP-301: Fee-Funded Node Payouts & Liquidity — On-Chain Revenue Model

[Scottcjn]

Summary

Bridge fees from wRTC transactions on Solana (and upcoming Base L2) should fund node operator payouts and liquidity pools — making the network self-sustaining without drawing from the community fund.

Fee Split Model

Every wRTC bridge transaction (deposit/withdrawal) generates a 0.5 RTC fee. These fees are split:

Allocation	%	Purpose
Liquidity Pools	40%	Fund Raydium (Solana) + Aerodrome/Uniswap (Base) LP positions
Node Operator Payouts	40%	Weekly rewards for attestation node runners (see #267)
Community Fund	20%	Replenish founder_community for bounties and development

How It Works

Revenue Flow

User bridges RTC ↔ wRTC
       ↓
  0.5 RTC fee collected
       ↓
  ┌─────────────┬─────────────┬─────────────┐
  │  40% → LP   │ 40% → Nodes │ 20% → Fund  │
  │  (0.20 RTC) │  (0.20 RTC) │  (0.10 RTC) │
  └─────────────┴─────────────┴─────────────┘

Self-Sustainability Threshold

• Node payout target: 100 RTC/week per node (per Run a RustChain Node — Earn 100 RTC/Week #267)
• At 3 nodes: Need 300 RTC/week for nodes = 750 RTC total fees/week
• That's ~1,500 bridge transactions/week (1,500 × 0.5 = 750 RTC)
• At 1,000 tx/week: 500 RTC fees → 200 RTC to nodes (covers 2 nodes)

Revenue Sources (Both Chains)

1. Solana wRTC Bridge (LIVE) — bottube.ai/bridge

   • Raydium pool: 8CF2Q8nSCxRacDShbtF86XTSrYjueBMKmfdR3MLdnYzb
   • 0.5 RTC withdrawal fee already in place

2. Base L2 wRTC Bridge (PLANNED) — see Base bridge plan

   • Aerodrome/Uniswap liquidity
   • Same 0.5 RTC fee structure
   • ~$0.01 gas per tx on Base

Scaling Table

Weekly Bridge TXs	Total Fees	→ Liquidity	→ Nodes	→ Fund	Nodes Supported
100	50 RTC	20	20	10	0 (supplement from fund)
500	250 RTC	100	100	50	1 node
1,000	500 RTC	200	200	100	2 nodes
2,500	1,250 RTC	500	500	250	5 nodes
5,000	2,500 RTC	1,000	1,000	500	10 nodes

Implementation

1. Fee collection: Already happens in wrtc_bridge_blueprint.py (0.5 RTC withdrawal fee)
2. Fee wallet: Create fee_pool wallet to collect all bridge fees
3. Weekly settlement: Cron job splits fee_pool balance 40/40/20
4. Node payouts: Automated weekly transfer to registered node operators
5. LP deposits: Manual or semi-automated LP position management

Phase 1 (Now — Before Self-Sustaining)

• Node payouts funded from community fund (per Run a RustChain Node — Earn 100 RTC/Week #267)
• Track bridge fee revenue separately in fee_pool wallet
• Report weekly fee revenue in epoch stats

Phase 2 (1,000+ bridge tx/week)

• Switch node payouts to fee-funded
• Community fund only supplements shortfall
• LP positions managed from fee revenue

Phase 3 (5,000+ bridge tx/week)

• Fully self-sustaining — zero draw from community fund
• Node operators earn from network activity
• LP depth grows organically

Related Issues

• Run a RustChain Node — Earn 100 RTC/Week #267 — Run a RustChain Node (100 RTC/week incentive)
• 📊 RTC Tokenomics & Value Model #31 — RTC Tokenomics
• Base L2 Bridge (planned)

Labels

tokenomics, enhancement, node-incentive