Hardhat Chad, founder of the ORE protocol, joined Genfinity to unpack a run of major updates. The conversation covered the new ORE Reserve, the STONK meme coin tie-in, and the V4 protocol release. It also previewed a coming collaboration with MetaDAO. Together, these updates aim to push ORE toward its stated goal. That goal is becoming Solana’s native, future-proof store of value.
What Is ORE, and Why Does It Call Itself Future-Proof?
ORE calls itself the future-proof version of peer-to-peer electronic cash. Hardhat Chad said the name nods directly to Bitcoin. The original idea, two years ago, was building a Solana-native version of Bitcoin. Unlike wrapped Bitcoin, ORE never needed a bridge to enter Solana. It could be mined natively, using Solana’s speed and low fees. Early mining activity grew so intense that it congested the Solana network itself. That congestion created real problems for other apps running on the chain. Since then, the team has rebuilt ORE’s mining design several times over. According to public documentation, ORE now runs on a grid-based mining system with a five-million-token supply cap. Miners deposit SOL into a 25-square grid, and one square wins each round. Winners split that round’s ORE emission along with SOL from the losing squares. The protocol keeps a share of that SOL as revenue, funding an ongoing buyback and burn process the team calls “burying” ORE.
ORE buybacks just got smarter. Introducing the ORE Reserve.
— ORE (@ORE) September 9, 2026
ORE mining generates protocol revenue that funds ORE buybacks. The Reserve will use a portion of that revenue to place buy-side liquidity below the current market price.
Initially, 1% of protocol revenue will be… pic.twitter.com/AfXBfWiG95
Inside the ORE Reserve: Protocol-Owned Liquidity as Buy-Side Support
The ORE Reserve sits at the center of the protocol’s latest evolution. Previously, ORE routed all buyback revenue into market orders through Jupiter. Hardhat Chad called that approach “top blasting,” since it spent every dollar as soon as fees arrived. The team wanted more efficient pricing on its buybacks instead. So ORE built the Reserve, a set of single-sided liquidity positions that act like limit orders. Meteora hosts these positions across several ORE-paired markets. The Reserve currently spans SOL, USDC, gold-backed tokens, and even Zcash. Each asset sits in its own market, ready to absorb any ORE that gets sold. Community members have started calling ORE the “store of value of store values.” That nickname captures the idea that ORE’s value now leans on a basket of established assets. With enough Reserve liquidity, Hardhat Chad said, the protocol could guarantee ORE’s supply hits zero before its price ever does. He also stressed that the Reserve stays open-ended by design. Any tokenized asset on Solana, including future assets that do not exist yet, could eventually join the mix.
STONK, Meme Coins, and the New Supply-Lock Vault
ORE’s Reserve was not the only story driving activity this year. A wave of meme coin trading swept through Solana, much of it tied to StonkFun. StonkFun is a launchpad that pairs meme tokens against tokenized stocks, ETFs, and commodities. Its flagship token, STONK, reportedly surged more than 250% in a single day. Its market capitalization briefly pushed past $240 million during that run. According to Hardhat Chad, the StonkFun team reached out to collaborate with ORE directly. The two projects worked together so users could pair meme coins with ORE, not just SOL. Every trade and transfer of those meme coins carries a small built-in tax. That tax generates fees denominated in ORE, which flow back to meme coin holders. The ORE community responded by launching a wave of ORE-themed meme coins for fun. Requests soon followed for a way to lock up meme coin supply permanently. Hardhat Chad and the Raydium team built a vault contract to solve that. Creators can now send ORE-paired meme coins into the vault to lock them up. Fees the vault collects get removed from circulation automatically, without manual intervention. Public reporting indicates the vault’s upgrade authority was frozen after launch. That freeze prevents the contract’s rules from changing later.
V4 Smooths the Rough Edges of ORE’s Mining System
V4 is not a full protocol overhaul, according to Hardhat Chad. He joked the team could have called it V3.5 instead. The update focuses on refining the grid-based mining system introduced in the prior version. That system already replaced ORE’s original computational proof-of-work design. V4 adds support for partial claims, a feature miners had requested repeatedly. It also adjusts the “mother lode” reward system, which occasionally pays out larger prizes. Most notably, V4 removes ORE’s old pari-mutuel payout structure entirely. That structure had raised the risk of losses for miners in unlucky rounds. Removing it lowers that downside considerably for everyday miners. Hardhat Chad said the miner community welcomed all of these changes quickly. He added that the team plans to slow down further V4-style tweaks for now. Additional features have been proposed, he said, but none felt urgent enough yet.
MetaDAO and the Future of Reserve Governance
The Reserve raises a genuinely hard question for ORE. Who decides which assets belong inside it, and at what price? Every Reserve position is a limit order, so someone must set that price. Since the Reserve holds protocol-owned liquidity, Hardhat Chad believes ORE holders deserve real input. He told Genfinity he has stayed close with the MetaDAO team for some time. MetaDAO was founded by the pseudonymous Proph3t and by Kollan House. The project pioneered futarchy, a governance model built on decision markets rather than simple voting. Traders in a futarchy system price the expected outcome of a proposal before it takes effect. MetaDAO already offers “Futarchy as a Service” to other Solana protocols, including Drift, Jito, and Marinade. Hardhat Chad said ORE and MetaDAO have finally found the right scope for a partnership. Going forward, ORE plans to lean on decision markets to help manage Reserve allocations. That could mean market-based signals on which assets enter the Reserve next. It could also shape how limit orders get priced across every venue the Reserve touches.
What’s Next for ORE
Hardhat Chad framed the current moment as a genuinely exciting one for crypto. Tokenized stocks, he argued, mark a real before-and-after moment for the industry. They let people outside the United States gain exposure to companies like Tesla. He pointed to fractional exposure through meme coin pairings as an early, unpolished example. ORE plans to keep expanding the Reserve with additional assets over time. Governance through MetaDAO-style decision markets will likely shape which assets get added. V4’s mining changes appear largely settled for now, barring fresh community requests. Genfinity will continue tracking ORE’s Reserve, its STONK integration, and its MetaDAO collaboration as each develops further.
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