gTrade (by Gains Network)

gTrade is a decentralized leveraged trading platform built by Gains Network, offering up to 150x leverage on crypto, 1000x on forex, and 250x on commodities across 290+ pairs including stocks, indices, and commodities. Designed for retail and professional traders, it operates on Arbitrum, Polygon, Solana, and MegaETH using a synthetic architecture that provides gasless, guaranteed-execution trading with every order settled transparently on-chain.

Where the yield comes from

gTrade earns money mainly from trading fees. Every time a trader opens or closes a position, they pay opening/closing fees, spreads (built-in price gaps), and borrowing fees. Because traders can use leverage (borrowed size), these fees are charged on the total trade size (leverage times the trader's own collateral), not just the collateral.

How the fees are split

The protocol divides its revenue like this:

• 54% → buys back and permanently removes GNS tokens from circulation (buyback and burn). This makes the remaining tokens scarcer over time.
• 22% → goes to the Governance/DAO fund (the community treasury).
• 15% → paid to gToken vault liquidity providers — the people who deposit assets into vaults that back every trade.
• 5% → rewards for referrals.
• 4% → fees for trigger keepers and oracle bots (automated services that execute limit orders).

The gToken vaults (the core of the system)

gToken vaults (gUSDC, gDAI, gETH, gAPE, gGNS, gBTCUSD) are pools where LPs deposit assets. These vaults follow the ERC-4626 standard (a common template for yield-bearing vaults). Vault LPs earn a slice of all trading fees proportional to how much they have deposited.

Crucially, the vault is the only counterparty to every trade on gTrade. That means:

• When a trader wins (positive PnL), the vault pays out those winnings.
• When a trader loses (negative PnL), those losses flow into the vault.

Overcollateralization buffer and GNS mechanics

The vaults keep an overcollateralization (OC) buffer — extra cushion beyond what is owed. When the vault is overcollateralized, excess trader losses buy back and burn GNS tokens (OTC — directly, not on an open market). When the vault is undercollateralized (a rare situation, limited to minting at most 0.05% of total GNS supply per 24 hours), new GNS is minted and sold OTC to refill the vault.

Borrowing fees (charged every block on whichever side of a trade is more popular, relative to vault size) also feed into this overcollateralization layer.

No external pools needed — vault LPs are the whole engine

Because gTrade uses a synthetic architecture (it doesn't depend on external AMMs or lending protocols), the gToken vault LPs are the only liquidity providers in the system. They earn fees in proportion to their share of the vault — no middlemen.

GNS staking (changed by governance)

Originally, GNS staking used a "Buyback & Distribute" model that sent 55% of revenue to stakers. A governance vote switched this: all staking rewards now go to buyback and burn instead, indefinitely.