Key Takeaways:
Pyth Network’s native token (PYTH) rose 11% in the last 24 hours to trade at $0.0510 after the oracle provider announced a significant infrastructure upgrade and a new economic model designed to create sustained buying pressure for the token.
“Pythnet is being retired, Oracle Integrity Staking (OIS) reward emissions are ending, while Lazer, Pyth Pro, and the Data Marketplace are the forward infrastructure,” the Pyth Network development team said in a blog post published Thursday. The changes shift the network’s focus to revenue-generating products.
The upgrade sunsets the Pythnet testnet and ends associated staking rewards. Going forward, the network will focus on Pyth Pro and the Data Marketplace, where protocol revenue is generated from users like the regulated prediction market Kalshi. Under a new economic model, the Pyth DAO treasury will use protocol revenue to execute monthly open-market purchases of PYTH, creating a consistent source of demand.
This new mechanism is designed to directly link the protocol’s growth to token value. Each month, the DAO will deploy one-third of its treasury balance to acquire PYTH from the open market. This follows a period of increased adoption, with platforms like Polymarket, Coinbase, OKX, and Bitget recently integrating Pyth’s oracle services.
The core of the token’s recent outperformance against a sideways crypto market is the shift in its economic model. By converting revenue from its data services into monthly PYTH purchases, the protocol establishes a direct link between platform usage and token demand. This automated buying mechanism is expected to provide a steady demand floor for PYTH.
The changes come as Pyth secures key integrations. Earlier this week, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC)-regulated prediction market, Kalshi, adopted Pyth Pro to power its real-world asset and commodities markets. This integration, along with others by major exchanges like Coinbase and OKX, signals growing institutional confidence in Pyth’s first-party data model, which sources price information directly from over 90 publishers, including major trading firms.
From a technical perspective, the PYTH/USD chart appears bullish. The token broke past the $0.050 resistance level, with the 4-hour Relative Strength Index (RSI) at 66, indicating bullish momentum that is not yet in overbought territory. The Moving Average Convergence Divergence (MACD) also remains in positive territory.
Should the bullish momentum continue, the next key resistance level is the 4-hour swing high of $0.0565. A sustained break above that could see the token target the $0.0633 level, which was last seen on February 14. Conversely, a market-wide correction could see PYTH retrace to its Thursday low of $0.0456. The token’s performance contrasts with Bitcoin, which fell less than 1% to trade below $78,000.
This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.
