When Trump launched his own meme Coin on Saturday, many people quickly made a lot of money - but at least one trader made much more than most, betting much earlier than most.
On Friday, four hours before Trump announced the launch of his Solana meme Coin TRUMP, an anonymous user deposited over $1 million worth of SOL into a brand new crypto wallet (labeled "6QSc2").
Within 30 seconds of Trump's announcement of the meme Coin on Truth Social on Friday night, that wallet purchased over 5.9 million TRUMP tokens. Within hours, those tokens were worth over $116 million.
According to analysis by blockchain research firm Bubblemaps, the trader then split the large TRUMP token position into 10 different Solana wallets and began selling them off in large quantities the next day. Bubblemaps says that as of Monday morning, the trader had sold $85 million worth of TRUMP, still holding another $75 million. Blockchain data currently shows these wallets only hold around $18 million worth of the meme coin, so the trader has likely sold off most of their position.
However, the story doesn't end there. On Sunday, First Lady Melania Trump followed her husband's lead and launched her own meme coin - and that lucky trader was early again. Within a minute and a half of Melania posting about the MELANIA token on Truth Social, and a minute before information about the token was released on X, one of the wallets associated with that user purchased a large amount of MELANIA tokens.
According to Bubblemaps, the trader sold $45 million worth of TRUMP tokens, apparently to establish a massive MELANIA position, causing TRUMP tokens to crash nearly 50% in a matter of minutes on Sunday afternoon.
Rumors abound on X of several other early TRUMP token buyers profiting handsomely, leading to suspicions of widespread insider trading. Decrypt could not confirm any insider information, but the large number of associated wallets linked to the "6QSc2" account is certainly eyebrow-raising.
Given that this trader placed such large buy orders before the majority of crypto users even learned of the news and realized this was not a carefully orchestrated hack attack, it's hard not to be suspicious.
However, it's also possible this trader just happened to be in the right place at the right time, having just set up new wallets, and made the right call in a timely manner. The trading history of the associated wallets shows this user has been buying and selling large amounts of meme coins for at least the past three months. They even bought some of the Hawk Tuah girl's meme coin when it was released.
But it's also possible this trader has wide connections and received advance information about the upcoming Trump meme coin release. If there was insider information, the leak may not necessarily have come from Trump's inner circle or crypto team.
Last weekend, several Solana decentralized finance projects like Jupiter, Meteora, and Moonshot revealed they had pre-coordinated with the Trump token team to ensure a smooth launch.
The token caused unprecedented activity on the Solana network, requiring many to work together to ensure the infrastructure operated properly. However, it's unclear how many employees at these projects were aware of the token plans in advance, and there's no evidence of any wrongdoing by any providers so far.
But at least one prominent crypto figure seems to have openly boasted about receiving advance insider information about the upcoming MELANIA token. Ran Neuner, co-founder and CEO of blockchain investment fund Onchain Capital, admitted as much in a post on X on Monday, lamenting that the Trump family is now "scamming at the expense of the crypto community".
"Don't get me wrong," Neuner wrote, "as my timeline shows, I knew about the MELANIA token before it was released, and I obviously profited from it."
In fact, Neuner publicly posted information about the upcoming MELANIA token nearly 90 minutes before the First Lady's first announcement about it on Truth Social.
Decrypt reached out to Neuner about the post but received no response.
