The Functor Foundation is planned to fund scholarships in mathematics, computer science, physics, statistics and engineering at leading universities. The money comes from a share of Functor's trading fees.
The money
Functor charges trading fees. 30% go to the liquidity vaults and 70% to the protocol. A defined share of the protocol's part is planned for the Foundation, written into its charter before mainnet.
Trading fees. The Foundation does not ask for donations and does not issue a token. Functor has one token, $FCTR.
The percentage is set in the charter and published, so it is a rule rather than a decision someone makes later.
Tuition and living costs. It is not a sponsorship, conference or marketing budget.
Functor is pre-testnet. There are no fees yet and no applications are open. This page describes the plan; the charter will set the binding terms.
Subjects
Undergraduate and master's study in the subjects the exchange is built out of: mathematics, statistics and probability, computer science, physics, and the engineering disciplines that rest on them.
The scholarships are meant for students who have been admitted to a strong course and would struggle to take up the place. They cover fees, maintenance and equipment.
How it works
Money goes to partner universities, and each university awards the scholarships itself.
The charter. A legal entity, a published charter, the share of fees, the selection principles and the reporting duties, drafted with counsel alongside Functor's own legal work.
Partner universities. A small number of departments to begin with, chosen for strength in the subjects funded. Each gets a multi-year commitment, so a department can plan around it.
Selection. The university's scholarship office awards the places against the published criteria. The Foundation does not choose individual students, and students are never paid in crypto.
Reporting. Every year: the amount contributed, the universities, the number of scholarships and the subjects. Students are named only if they want to be.
Transparency
The fee split is enforced by the chain, so the amount reaching the Foundation is a number anyone can read from the blockchain.
The Foundation's account is published, so its balance and every transfer out of it can be checked.
Money in, scholarships out, universities and subjects. Published in a bad year as well as a good one.
The Foundation is a separate legal entity from the company building the exchange, with its own accounts.
Why
Functor is built out of work that universities did and taught: stochastic analysis, category theory, order-book microstructure, cryptography. Paying for the next set of students is a use for trading fees that does not depend on the token price, and it is the part of this project that will still matter in twenty years.
Questions
No. Applications will run through partner universities once the charter and the partnerships are in place. Nothing is open today.
No. Functor has one token, $FCTR, and the Foundation will not issue another. Nothing on this page is an offer to sell anything.
A defined share of Functor's trading fees, fixed in the charter and published before mainnet. The amount depends on how much the exchange is used.
Universities already run admissions, means testing and payments, and they are accountable for them. It also keeps the choice of students independent of us.
They will be named when the first agreements are signed.
The Foundation's share comes out of the protocol's portion of trading fees. The full split will be published, so anyone can see what goes to the liquidity vaults, to buybacks and to the Foundation.