Token Is All You Price
Abstract
A seller of a dynamic information service under an information-throughput constraint screens buyers who privately differ in urgency. We characterize the revenue-optimal mechanism: deploy a single preference-aligned belief process; screen buyers with a menu of stopping-time caps. The result rationalizes tokenized GenAI pricing, from consumer subscription tiers to B2B API service tiers. Extensions to heterogeneous valuations and endogenous reasoning quality preserve the qualitative conclusions.