Celebrity memecoins: Who's winning, who's losing?

It starts with a viral post. The token price skyrockets. Then, the sell-off begins. For celebrity memecoins, the pattern is familiar—and profitable for some. But for regular investors? The losses pile up fast.

The celebrity token trend took off in May 2024 when former athlete and TV personality Caitlyn Jenner introduced the $JENNER token through Solana-based Pump.Fun, which is a popular memecoin generator. The launch sparked controversy, with some speculating that her X account had been hacked. However, she later confirmed that her endorsement was legitimate. 

Nothing has been hacked. 🚀 🚀 🚀 https://t.co/SiYwteBGkv https://t.co/pyxl6EvOBC

— Caitlyn Jenner (@Caitlyn_Jenner) May 26, 2024

The $JENNER memecoin surged quickly, reaching more than $113 million in trading volume within four hours, according to the celebrity.

But the momentum didn’t last. After its launch on Ethereum, the token’s value plunged 66% within a day. By November, investors who claimed to have been misled filed a lawsuit against Jenner.

Another more recent celebrity memecoin case is that of $TRUMP and $MELANIA, launched by the US President and his first lady right before the inauguration. When $TRUMP was launched, its value skyrocketed, eventually peaking with a market cap of more than $14.75 billion before violently dropping after a number of days. 

Currently, $TRUMP trades at about $15, a steep decline from its $75 peak. Chainalysis reports that over 813,000 crypto wallets have collectively lost nearly $2 billion on the memecoin.

Meanwhile, $MELANIA, which once peaked at $13, has now dropped to just $1.

🧵1/8 While most wallets holding $TRUMP are retail buyers who have roughly broken even, ~50 whales have a realized profit at a wallet level in excess of >$10M. What else do we know from analyzing $TRUMP and $MELANIA ⛓️on-chain? 👇

— Chainalysis (@chainalysis) January 22, 2025

Celebrity memecoins tend to follow the same pattern: a sudden surge, then a sharp collapse. According to crypto research firm Messari, major celebrity tokens have fallen 78% from their peak. This includes high-profile names like $TRUMP, $MELANIA, $MOTHER, and $DADDY.

Some investors accuse celebrities and prominent figures of scamming people with their memecoins. One common scam is a rug pull, where the creators hype up a crypto project to attract investors, only to abandon it—leaving everyone with worthless tokens. 

Another is a pump and dump scheme, which happens when those who launch a token artificially raise the price to attract buyers (the “pump”), then quickly sell off their own tokens at the peak, causing the crash (the “dump”). In both cases, regular investors end up losing money while the scammers walk away with huge profits. 

American rapper Kanye West spoke out about the issue, saying he was offered $2 million to launch a fake “Ye” cryptocurrency. The plan was for him to promote the coin, then later claim he was hacked just eight hours after the launch, ultimately tricking fans. 

Kanye West was offered $2 million to launch a fake ‘Ye’ token, scam his community, and pretend he got hacked.

This is how celebrity rug pulls happen. Glad he turned down the offer… don’t fall for celebrity coins.

But if he had launched it, would you have bought it? pic.twitter.com/FBnpAwJl2w

— Money Guru Digital (@Moneygurudigi) February 8, 2025

In 2024, scammers stole over $500 million through memecoin rug pulls and fraud, according to Merkle Science. Many used social engineering, posing as trusted figures to deceive investors.

Merkle Science explained, “Attackers generally prefer accounts that have some alignment with technology, or accounts that have trust of their fandom.” Celebrities made up 33% of the victims.

These trends and insights highlight a clear issue in the crypto space: the dangers of speculative investing. Vitalik Buterin, the co-founder of Ethereum, gave his two cents regarding the celebrity memecoin craze on X in June. For him to find celebrity crypto projects respectable, they should serve a goal for the public good, offer fun mechanics beyond trading, and implement something that could last long term. 

A quick summary of features that a celebrity crypto project needs to have for me to be more willing to respect it:

1. Have some kind of public-good goal that it's serving, other than enriching the celebrity and early adopters. Realistically, either an art project or the…

— vitalik.eth (@VitalikButerin) June 5, 2024

The rise and fall of these celebrity memecoins reveal the risks of investing based on hype rather than substance. Several investors get caught up in the excitement, only to suffer losses when the bubble bursts. 

Echoing this concern, GMCI, a crypto index provider, emphasized a key takeaway: “We should definitely focus more on fundamentals than hype when making investment decisions.”