FAQ

Saturn is a Solana-based vault protocol that earns yield on your SOL by automatically writing covered call options each week. You deposit SOL, the vault handles the options strategy, and you collect the premium as yield — no trading knowledge required. Think of it as a passive yield account backed by an on-chain options market.

A covered call strategy means the vault sells the right for someone else to buy your SOL at a fixed price (the "strike") before a set expiry date. In exchange, the vault receives a cash premium upfront, which becomes your yield. If SOL stays below the strike at expiry, the vault keeps everything; if SOL rises above the strike, the vault pays the difference to the option buyer — which is the primary risk to your principal.

No. Saturn's smart contracts and off-chain services handle strike selection, auction pricing, and settlement automatically each week. You simply deposit SOL, and the vault manages the rest. The FAQ and Risk pages explain the mechanics for those who want to dig deeper, but day-to-day use requires no options expertise.

Target premium yield is approximately 10% NET in normal market conditions. This is an estimate from a bullish 2024–2026 backtest window and is not guaranteed — realized yield will be lower in calmer or bearish markets. In extreme conditions the vault may skip a weekly epoch: you simply hold your assets that week (no premium earned, no loss). Yield varies week to week based on market conditions, implied volatility, and whether options expire in-the-money.

The main risks are: (1) capped upside — if SOL price rises sharply above the strike, the vault pays the difference, reducing your SOL balance; (2) smart contract risk — the protocol is not yet audited; (3) oracle/infrastructure risk — settlement depends on Pyth price feeds and off-chain keeper services. See the full risk disclosure at /risk for detail on each category.

Friktion and PsyFi relied on third-party market makers who disappeared during bear markets, leaving vaults unable to fill their auctions. Saturn runs its own market-making bot that participates in every weekly auction regardless of broader market conditions. Vault SOL is never held or settled on a CEX — custody and settlement are entirely on-chain. Option strike pricing uses implied volatility sourced from Deribit (a CEX) with a realized-volatility fallback, and the auction itself runs as an on-chain Dutch auction so pricing is transparent and verifiable.

Saturn has not yet been audited. An audit is planned before mainnet launch. The current devnet deployment is for testing purposes only, and deposit caps are set conservatively to limit exposure during this phase. We will publish the full audit report publicly when it is complete.

Saturn uses a Pending Queue: deposits made while an epoch's options are live are queued and activated at the next epoch boundary, not instantly. This design prevents mid-epoch entry at a stale share price and ensures all depositors in the same epoch start at a fair net-asset-value. Your SOL moves on-chain immediately, but share minting waits for the epoch transition — typically up to one week.

You request a withdrawal at any time by burning your vault shares; the on-chain contract records the request and holds it until the current epoch ends. At the epoch boundary the keeper processes pending withdrawals, and you receive SOL back into your wallet. The maximum delay is one full epoch (currently one week), matching the options expiry cycle so the vault always has enough liquidity to honor redemptions.

Saturn currently supports Phantom and Solflare wallets on Solana. The vault contract, assets, and yield are all native SOL — there are no bridged tokens or cross-chain components. Support for additional Solana wallets may be added before mainnet launch.

Saturn is currently running on Solana devnet only. The active devnet vault runs a 1-week cadence and is accessible for testing via the Saturn app. Mainnet launch is planned after the audit is complete and the protocol has been validated through a full devnet cycle. The app displays a devnet banner so there is no ambiguity about which network you are on.

Vault Points (VP) are a measure of community participation earned by joining the waitlist, connecting a wallet with DeFi history, and referring friends. Your tier (Bronze, Silver, Gold, Diamond) is determined by your total VP and influences your tier-weighted consideration in any future protocol governance or token event. VP may be considered in future governance — no specific token allocation, multiplier, or timeline is promised, and nothing here constitutes a guarantee of tokens or financial return.

Saturn is built by a small team focused on making Solana options infrastructure reliable for the long term. The best way to reach us right now is on Twitter at @saturnprotocol_. We do not yet have a public Discord; announcements, protocol updates, and vault status are posted on Twitter.

Please report bugs and share feedback by sending a direct message or public reply on Twitter at @saturnprotocol_. Include as much detail as possible — wallet address, what you were trying to do, and any error messages you saw. During the devnet phase, prompt bug reports are especially valuable and we aim to respond quickly.