Singapore, Singapore — September 23, 2026 — Crypto-native travel booking platform Travala and the AVA Foundation today announced a new matching buyback structure for the AVA token, doubling the token's monthly open-market buyback volume. The initiative introduces a Travala-funded buyback that operates independently of, and in addition to, the AVA Foundation's existing rewards-replenishment buyback. All matched AVA will be transferred to a Strategic Reserve that Travala has committed never to sell or transfer.

The structure, as the company describes it, is straightforward: more travel bookings lead to more member givebacks, which drive more open-market AVA buybacks and, ultimately, more AVA permanently locked away.

How the Existing Buyback Works

Each month, the AVA Foundation replenishes the prior month's AVA givebacks by repurchasing, token for token, the exact quantity of AVA distributed to AVA Smart Program members on the open market, then transferring those tokens back into the Ecosystem Incentives Wallet, an established pillar of the AVA rewards model. To date, a total of 4,824,722 AVA has been repurchased through historical buybacks to replenish rewards distributed to AVA Smart members.

What Changes

Starting now, Travala will independently match that amount every month, buying back an equal quantity of AVA on the open market and transferring it to the new Travala AVA Strategic Reserve Wallet, secured through multi-signature custody, an arrangement requiring approvals from multiple private keys before funds can move — a setup commonly used to secure treasury holdings. Travala has committed that AVA held in the Reserve will never be sold or transferred out. Both buybacks are separately verifiable on-chain.

Together, the two mechanisms lift monthly open-market buyback volume to 2x the volume of AVA Smart member givebacks, up from 1x previously. While the Foundation's buyback replenishes the rewards pool, Travala's matching buyback permanently removes the matched amount from circulating supply. That lock is what separates the Reserve, in accounting terms, from buyback programs in which repurchased tokens sit in a treasury and remain in circulating-supply calculations: tokens under a permanent no-sell, no-transfer commitment can qualify as non-circulating under the methodologies used by major market-data providers.

Inaugural Buyback Already Completed

The first Travala Monthly AVA Buyback has already been executed. Following the AVA Foundation's September buyback of 369,881.04 AVA, which covered August AVA Smart member givebacks, Travala independently matched the amount with an additional 369,881.04 AVA open-market purchase. Combined, the two buybacks resulted in 739,762.08 AVA repurchased from the open, with Travala's 369,881.04 AVA allocation transferred to the new AVA Strategic Reserve Wallet, where it will remain permanently outside circulating supply under the no-sell, no-transfer commitment. The Reserve is publicly verifiable on-chain at 0x7bed1889c21d9eb3560463c14cd74fe29f2d03b6.

"AVA is at the center of everything we're building at Travala," said Juan Otero, CEO of Travala. "It's how our community is rewarded and how they engage with the platform every day. This matching buyback reflects just how integral AVA is to our ecosystem, and we're proud to make that commitment permanent and fully verifiable for the community that's built this with us."

A Mechanism That Scales With Activity

The mechanism scales directly with platform activity: higher AVA Smart member givebacks result in larger AVA Foundation buybacks and, through Travala's matching structure, larger Travala open-market buybacks and additional AVA permanently locked in the Strategic Reserve. The practical upshot: each month's combined open-market purchase is tied to booking activity from the prior month rather than to a fixed purchase schedule, so monthly totals will move with member givebacks.

Supply Accounting and Transparency

Because AVA transferred into the Strategic Reserve Wallet is permanently locked, each monthly allocation is removed from circulating supply and excluded from AVA's official circulating supply via the AVA circulating supply API. Travala will also submit the Reserve wallet address to CoinMarketCap and CoinGecko for treatment as non-circulating under their respective methodologies.

Every transfer across both wallets is verifiable on-chain, and Travala and the AVA Foundation will publicly report both buyback figures each month going forward. Each monthly Travala buyback will be executed after the AVA Foundation's giveback figure for the prior month has been published. For readers following along, the checkpoints ahead are each month's published giveback and matching-buyback figures, the corresponding transfers at the Reserve address, and any updates from CoinMarketCap and CoinGecko on the Reserve's non-circulating classification.

Recent Context

The announcement follows AVA's recent listing on Bithumb's KRW market, expanding direct access for Korean traders and adding a new venue alongside AVA's existing exchange footprint.

Travala was also recently named by Amazon Web Services as a customer case study for the general availability launch of its Bedrock AgentCore payments platform, with CEO Juan Otero quoted on how the integration streamlines agentic, conversational booking across Travala's inventory of more than 2.2 million hotels globally.

About Travala

Founded in 2017 and now backed by Binance, Travala is the leading crypto-native travel booking service, offering more than 2,200,000 properties across 230 countries, 600+ airlines, 50,000+ car rental locations, and 400,000+ activities globally. The platform accepts over 100 leading cryptocurrencies alongside traditional payment methods and offers a Best Price Guarantee. Smart members can also access additional discounts and loyalty rewards on eligible bookings. More information is available at www.travala.com.

About the AVA Foundation

The AVA Foundation oversees the AVA token ecosystem, including the AVA Smart Program, the AVA token, and Travel Tiger NFTs. The AVA token functions as the key to accessing the AVA Smart Program, which provides travel perks and other benefits to Travala customers, such as AVA payment discounts, AVA loyalty rewards, and gated-access benefits. AVA tokenizes the concept of loyalty reward programs using blockchain technology, bringing web3 to traditional loyalty models. More information is available at www.avafoundation.org.

Media contact: Sam Woollard, Chief Marketing Officer, Travala — sam@travala.com

Source: Chainwire