---
title: "How it works"
description: "How builder fees move from a fill on Hyperliquid to your contract, on Starter and after activation."
---

> Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.floatout.xyz/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# How it works

Floatout hosts the frontend for Hyperliquid perps and outcome markets. This page explains how a trade turns into a builder fee, and where that fee goes.

## Hyperliquid runs the exchange

Hyperliquid runs the order book and the matching for every trade on your DEX. It also runs liquidations for perps. Traders and market makers supply orders. Available liquidity varies by market.

Trader funds sit in each trader's own Hyperliquid account. Your DEX never holds trader funds and cannot move them.

You supply the frontend and the distribution. Hyperliquid supplies the exchange.

## Builder fees

Eligible orders carry a builder code and a fee. Hyperliquid records collected builder fees against that code.

Outcome builder fees apply to eligible sell activity. Do not count settlement proceeds as builder revenue. Protocol fees and builder fees are different charges.

Before their first trade, a trader signs one approval naming the maximum fee they accept for your builder code. Your DEX cannot charge more than that maximum.

Hyperliquid caps the fee per fill: 0.1% on perps, 1% on spot-style markets, which includes outcome markets.

## Starter and activated

On Starter, orders carry Floatout's builder code. Builder fees go to Floatout. They are not a claimable balance for you. Activation applies to future eligible fees.

Activation deploys a contract for your DEX. That contract's address becomes your builder code, so fees now accrue to it instead.

Because the builder code changes at activation, each returning trader approves the new builder code once. New traders approve it the first time they trade.

## Where fees accrue

After activation, builder fees accrue to your contract, not to an account Floatout holds for you.

The ledger computes who is owed what from the fills Hyperliquid recorded. Floatout publishes a root, a summary of the ledger, to your contract. Correct allocation depends on that publisher. Root publication has no administrative timelock delay.

Each wallet claims its own share against that root. The contract checks the proof against the root and pays only the wallet the proof names.

Your contract has no withdraw function. Funds leave it only through a claim to the wallet the proof names.

## Who gets a share

Out of the builder fees your DEX generates:

- You take the remainder, after the shares below.
- Affiliates take the kickback rate you set, on the volume they refer.
- Referred traders take a kickback too, if you set one for them.
- Floatout takes its platform share.

Every share is computed from fills Hyperliquid recorded. A rate change applies to new fills only. It never changes what a wallet already earned.

Read [Security model](/reference/security-model) for the full description of the roles on your contract, the timelock, and what Floatout operates.

Source: https://docs.floatout.xyz/start/how-it-works/index.mdx