ICO project log 10: why we chose CCA
how we picked the sale mechanism for Tally's ICO
Over the next 60 days, we’re documenting every step of what it looks like to launch a token the right way, in the United States, in 2026.
This is the project log: a written companion to each daily video. Short updates on what we’re working on, what’s blocking us, and what we’re learning along the way.
Day 20/60
Before we decided how to launch the TALLY token, we had to answer a question that turned out to be harder than expected: is there actually a token sale mechanism out there that we trust?
For a long time, the honest answer was no.
Every mechanism had the same problem
We looked at every major sale mechanism on the market. Not edge cases: structural problems.
Bonding curves, popularized by platforms like Pump.fun, are simple to understand and a playground for exploitation. There’s no real price discovery happening. The price is set by a formula, not by what the market actually thinks the token is worth.
Dutch auctions sound better in theory but are worse in practice. You start at a high price that decreases over time, and you have to decide: bid now and probably overpay, or wait and risk missing out entirely. It’s a high-stakes timing game, and sophisticated actors will always be better at it.
Batch auctions get closer. They collect all bids over a period and clear at a single uniform price. But all bids are visible on-chain, which means sophisticated traders can watch the demand curve build and then snipe the final blocks with optimally sized bids.
Every mechanism we looked at had the same core issue: they rewarded speed over conviction.
We needed something better
We’re a team launching our own token. We’ve talked a lot in this series about how a token sale is a one-shot event: you don’t recover from a failed launch. We weren’t about to subject the TALLY token to a mechanism where bots could front-run our community, where whales could manipulate the clearing price, or where people who showed up early got punished for it.
We needed something better. For a while, it didn’t exist.
Then Uniswap shipped Continuous Clearing Auctions
In November 2025, Uniswap announced Continuous Clearing Auctions: a new protocol built on top of Uniswap V4. When we saw it, we knew immediately this was what we had been looking for.
CCA runs the auction block by block. Instead of one big batch that clears in a single moment, supply is released gradually across multiple blocks, and each block clears at its own uniform price: the highest price at which all tokens in that block can be sold. Everyone who fills in a given block pays the same price, and no individual trade moves the price.
Here’s the part that really sold us: CCA rewards early participation. When you bid early, your bid is active across all remaining blocks. In early blocks, demand is typically lower, so clearing prices tend to be lower, and your early bid captures allocation at those prices.
That completely flips the incentive structure. In every other mechanism, the smart move is to wait, watch, and snipe. In CCA, the smart move is to show up early with genuine conviction about what you think the token is worth. It transforms the question from “when is the optimal time to bid?” to “what is the maximum price I will pay?”, which is real price discovery.
When the auction ends, all proceeds are automatically deployed to a Uniswap V4 liquidity pool at the discovered price. Instant liquidity from day one. No scrambling for market makers. No thin order books.
Why we’re building on CCA
CCA is MEV resistant. It’s sniping resistant. It rewards genuine participation over bots. It produces real price discovery instead of formula-driven or manipulable outcomes. And it creates liquidity automatically.
That’s why Tally is building around CCA as our primary launch mechanism. When teams come to us, we want to put them on the best available infrastructure. We spent a long time waiting for a mechanism that met the standard we set: not just for our clients, but for ourselves.
We’re documenting everything: the legal sequencing, the tax strategy, the custody setup, the go-to-market, all of it. If you’re building in crypto and thinking about launching a token, this is the playbook we wish existed.
Disclaimer: This content is for informational and educational purposes only. Nothing in this series constitutes financial advice, investment advice, or a solicitation to buy or sell any token or security.