Pump.fun's IC0 drama: a tug-of-war of confusion, doubt and controversy

07-14

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Author: Fairy, ChainCatcher

Editor: TB, ChainCatcher

Pump.fun's public offering is undoubtedly the top traffic topic in the crypto space recently.

After three delays, it successfully chose to launch during the time when Bitcoin broke through to a new high. In 12 minutes, $500 million was fully subscribed, with a valuation of $4 billion, ranking as the third-largest ICO in history.

Amid the heat, doubts followed like a shadow. Pump.fun's grand drama was full of twists and turns. The upcoming opening will truly unveil the prelude to this tug-of-war.

Pump.fun's Token Issuance Path: Chaos, Controversy, Criticism

Pump.fun's token issuance journey, from initial rumors to public offering, has been constantly marked by chaos, controversy, and criticism.

Its co-founder Alon Cohen had repeatedly publicly denied issuing a token. In April this year, he even "clarified" on social platforms: "Don't expect me, Pump.fun, or any employee to issue a token." More ironically, Alon once said: "The only benefit of a pre-sale is that money can go directly into your pocket. Every pre-sale is a scam."

Now, by launching a pre-sale himself, every sentence has become a "face-slapping quote".

Image source: AB Kuai.Dong

The release rhythm was also dramatic, with three delays, each hitting the emotional pulse. According to a crypto KOL, the first delay occurred on January 25th, with SOL dropping over 18% in the following week; the second delay was on February 15th, with SOL's maximum drop reaching 52%; the third delay was on June 20th, with a sudden escalation of the Middle East situation that evening.

On July 7th, Gate briefly listed Pump.fun's token sales page before quickly removing it, sparking numerous speculations. On July 9th, Pump.fun officially announced the public offering. Thereafter, more waves of controversy surged.

With the disclosure of the public offering information, market doubts erupted:

The valuation of $4 billion was questioned for lacking project and market fundamentals to support such a valuation;
The public offering banned US and UK users, sarcastically dubbed an "Asia-customized pre-sale";
The team's past continuous selling of SOL for cash raised high market suspicions about whether they would "protect the market", with speculation that the team might "exit liquidity".

On the day of sale, chaos ensued. Users who successfully participated through the official website completed their subscriptions, while most users trying to purchase through CEXs missed out, leading to widespread complaints. Thus, this already controversial PUMP public offering added further doubts about CEXs' technical stability and public relations capabilities.

Here is the situation of token subscription through various channels compiled by crypto KOL Yuyue:

Crypto KOL AB Kuai.Dong revealed that multiple sources indicated Pump.fun had "ghosted" exchanges' fundraising, causing problems for six exchanges. Additionally, Pump.fun previously promised to provide 15% of token shares for pre-sale, but the actual issued volume was quietly cut to 2.5%, with no explanation from the project team.

Pump.fun ICO Performance

In this sale, 89.7% of purchases were made through the website, with only 10.3% through CEXs. The website had 10,145 successful buyers. Here's the purchase scale for website buyers:

Image source: Dune

Most users purchased less than $1,000, totaling 5,758. However, capital was highly concentrated, with the top 340 addresses buying over $300 million, accounting for 60%, with an average investment of about $44,000 per address.

Community user @splinter0n's monitored data showed Kraken's pre-sale "participants" were only 2, Gate had 15, and Kucoin had 120 participants. While these data are difficult to fully verify, they again reflect the awkward situation of CEX users almost completely missing out.

Currently, the 6 CEXs participating in the PUMP public offering have received token distributions: Kraken received 7.5 billion, Bitget received 7.5 billion, Gate received 6.4 billion, Bybit received 5 billion, MEXC received 5 billion, and Kucoin received 4.1 billion.

Additionally, on-chain analyst Ai Yi pointed out that Wintermute might be one of PUMP's market makers. Yesterday, the Pump.fun project team transferred 10 PUMP tokens to multiple addresses for small-scale testing, including addresses previously belonging to Wintermute, with more tokens expected to flow to market maker addresses in the next two days.

On the Eve of Opening, Market Speculation Intensifies

Gate's page shows $PUMP will open for trading at 12 midnight tonight. The pre-market price has already reached $0.0062, with the market entering a highly speculative stage.

Community user @jain_web3 interpreted: Selling out in 12 minutes created a strong scarcity atmosphere. Many users placed short positions last night, which were then liquidated, favoring a high opening price. He further predicted the next step might be a high opening, with pre-sale users selling at high prices, and many users who missed the sale potentially FOMO-buying at high prices due to scarcity and high excitement, with dense trading areas possibly far exceeding $0.004.

Crypto KOL @sky_gpt believed this was a familiar script: "High open, rapid pull, quick sell-off, continuous decline, trapping 'eager' users for a second harvest."

On the on-chain prediction platform Polymarket, "What will Pump.fun's token market cap (FDV) be one day after launch" became a hot betting topic. Most users predicted the FDV would be above $4 billion and below $8 billion, reflecting the market's high divergence between excitement and risk.

With a noisy pre-sale, Pump.fun has pushed the crypto market's contradictions and FOMO emotions to the extreme. Tonight, all speculations, controversies, and chips will converge, and the market will ultimately reveal the true direction of this competition.