Casino Odds Outshine Meme Tokens

The odds of finding a successful meme coin for profitable investment on the Pump.fun platform are lower than placing a winning bet in a casino, reports Cointelegraph.

A trader and creator of a thematic dashboard on Dune, known as Adam, provided statistics for a single day. Out of 16,357 tokens launched through the “meme factory,” only 175 made it to the DEX Raydium. Of these, just 19 surpassed a market capitalization threshold of $69,000. At this point, Pump.fun closes the “bonding curve,” as the asset gains guaranteed liquidity for listing.

The @pumpdotfun trenches is a slaughterhouse.

In the last 24 hours…

16,357 tokens launched.
175 made it to Raydium.
19 remain above the 69k market cap.

From launch to profitable graduation that’s 0.12%. pic.twitter.com/pzLVTpcHWr

— Adam (@Adam_Tehc) August 10, 2024

This means that only 0.12% of launched coins reach a profitable level.

“The trenches of Pump.fun are a slaughterhouse,” emphasized Adam.

Odds Favour the Casino

In a comment to the publication, the trader explained that investing $100 in a token with a market capitalization of $5,000, if it grows to $69,000, yields a profit of $1,380.

Journalists compared his data with the odds in roulette—one of the most popular casino games.

It turned out that even a $100 bet on a number (1 in 38) yields $3,600 with a 2.6% probability. The least risky options like red/black or even/odd have a 47% chance of doubling the amount.

Adam noted that a direct comparison is not entirely accurate, as in trading, the “win” level can be much higher:

“A token can reach much more than $69,000 [capitalization] after launch. But this is becoming increasingly rare. Hence the disappointment.”

Data published in the comments by Newton Einstein confirmed the trader’s statistics.

gotta love the game to keep doing this everyday pic.twitter.com/e5LC5dy7UN

— Rudy Ishida (Run It Back Arc) (@rudylio_ishida) August 11, 2024

Out of 1.7 million tokens launched on Pump.fun, only 41 maintained a market capitalization above $1 million for several weeks. Only 15 meme coins recorded a value of more than $10 million over a similar period.

Pump.fun Defends Itself

Against this backdrop, the platform is causing increasing disappointment and irritation among traders, some of whom are leaving the market altogether.

I’m boycotting. Dead serious. Done trading pump fun and suggest you do the same. Laughing in our faces while they tap us dry with enabling a million rugs.

— bill spacman (@BillSPACman) August 13, 2024

“I’m boycotting. Seriously. Done trading on Pump.fun and suggest you do the same. They laugh in our faces while draining us dry by enabling a million rug pulls,” wrote one of them.

Crypto influencer Beanie confirmed that the platform remains profitable despite user failures.

No doubt Pump Fun and the insiders and professional ruggers that dominate the platform are this cycle’s financial winners. But it’s not zero-sum game. By design it’s making a million dollars a day in fees while leaving a sea of dead bodies in its wake. Need a more fair launchpad.

— Beanie (@beaniemaxi) August 13, 2024

“No doubt, Pump.fun, along with insiders and professional scammers dominating the platform, are the financial winners of this cycle. But it’s not a zero-sum game. By design, it makes a million dollars a day in fees while leaving a sea of dead bodies in its wake. A fairer launchpad is needed,” he emphasized.

On August 9, Pump.fun made changes to its mechanism, abolishing the $2 fee for token issuance. Instead, the platform introduced a reward of 0.5 SOL (~$70) for completing the “bonding curve.”

Some commentators expressed concerns that this would lead to a multiple increase in the number of new meme coins. However, Adam noted that the number of launches tends to decrease.

Actually, # of tokens hasn’t increased since the update, yet

Peaked at 18k tokens 4 days ago and trending downwards since. pic.twitter.com/oDP8LbP4OI

— Adam (@Adam_Tehc) August 11, 2024

The founder of Pump.fun, under the pseudonym Sapijiju, explained the fee cancellation as a desire to increase the number of launches.

For those wondering why we made coin creation on Pump free:

Our thesis is that the more coins/content that is created, the higher the likelihood that there will be something worth consuming and fun to trade for our customers.

To everyone stressing over saturation or blaming…

— Sapijiju (@sapijiju) August 13, 2024

“Our thesis is that the more coins/content that is created, the higher the likelihood that there will be something worth consuming and fun to trade for our customers,” he stated.

According to him, the platform should not be blamed for market saturation. Instead, the community should join Pump.fun in identifying unscrupulous players, duplicate coins, and bots, Sapijiju believes.

Celebrity Meme Token Promoter Earns Up to $3 Million

An investigation by community members confirmed Beanie’s point about influencer benefits.

Renowned on-chain sleuth ZachXBT determined that celebrity meme coin promoter on Pump.fun, Sahil Arora, earned up to $3 million from their issuance.

The expert refuted a much higher estimate of $26.4 million by the Bubblemaps team.

Sorry the math for this seems incorrect there is no way Sahil made $26M check the liquidity on these coins.

Would estimate he made <$5M at most and likely only $2-3M. The Celeb meta also died off extremely quickly. pic.twitter.com/cFzMSVLLRg

— ZachXBT (@zachxbt) August 14, 2024

According to Bubblemaps, Arora involved a number of well-known personalities in this activity, including former athletes Floyd Mayweather and Caitlyn Jenner, singer Jason Derulo, rappers Iggy Azalea and Lil Pump, actress Amber Rose, and others.

Arora allegedly acted as an intermediary, issuing tokens on their behalf (sometimes without their knowledge), and then persuaded them to promote the assets via social media. He then supposedly sold off a significant portion of the coins, leading to price crashes.

“Despite thousands of fans losing money, Sahil’s actions fall into a legal gray area, making it difficult to prosecute him. Celebrities don’t even try, understanding they are partially responsible,” experts noted.

As reported, the cryptocurrency data service DEX Screener launched a competing platform on Solana with Pump.fun for creating meme coins called Moonshot.