Following Aster's adjustment to its token mechanism, the decentralized perpetual contract platform ASTER initially surged, but the upward momentum failed to sustain. Influenced by a combination of positive protocol developments and hawkish signals from the Federal Reserve, the token experienced significant two-way volatility within 24 hours.
99% of daily transaction fees are used for repurchase.
Aster has announced a new automatic buyback program, committing to using 99% of its daily transaction fees to buy back ASTER tokens. According to the disclosure, the tokens obtained from the buyback will not re-enter the market but will be distributed to veASTER holders.
veASTER is a non-transferable governance and reward token earned by locking ASTER. Holders receive a share of platform fees, governance voting rights, and trading fee discounts on Aster DEX.
Repurchase and destruction
Aster also stated that each buyback will trigger an equivalent burn of tokens from the protocol reserve to further reduce circulating supply. The burns will be performed bi-weekly until the total supply drops to 3 billion tokens.
Currently, the total supply of ASTER is approximately 7.82 billion tokens. This means that the new mechanism not only directly links platform revenue to token incentives but also incorporates supply reduction arrangements into a fixed process.
The old linear release mode has ended.
This adjustment also means that Aster is exiting its previous linear release model. Under the old model, tokens were automatically released into the market according to a schedule, without adjustment based on changes in demand. This arrangement ended in January 2026.
The agreement states that the new mechanism will directly convert the platform's own trading activities into token buybacks and on-chain settlement rewards, and emphasizes that the process will not rely on discretionary reserve allocation.
After rising, it gave back its gains.
Fueled by news of the new mechanism, ASTER rose more than 10% on Wednesday, reaching $0.80, its highest level since January. However, as the Federal Reserve released hawkish signals and the dollar strengthened, risk assets as a whole came under pressure, and ASTER subsequently retreated.
As of press time, ASTER was trading at approximately $0.68, down about 5% on the day. This indicates that while the positive impact of the single agreement may provide a short-term boost to sentiment, price performance remains easily suppressed when macroeconomic pressures dominate the market.
