Jessy, Golden Finance
On July 12, the token Pump from Pump.fun will be publicly sold. This public sale is in collaboration with several second-tier exchanges like Kucoin, Bitget, MEXC, etc.
The total issuance of PUMP is 1 trillion tokens, with 33% issued in the ICO at a price of 0.004 USD. Among them, 600 million USD is raised publicly on exchanges, and 700 million USD worth of tokens is sold to institutions through private placement.
The launch of this token coincided with the recovery of the market, with Bitcoin breaking new highs again and overall liquidity in the crypto market slowly recovering. Industry insiders are mostly pessimistic about Pump.fun's token issuance because with the Meme market cooling down, Pump.fun's revenue has also significantly decreased. This token issuance is considered another harvesting action while the market liquidity is recovering.
Jocy, founding partner of IOSG, stated on social media that this public offering of Pump.fun is more like liquidity exit for participants; it is a highly speculative gamble.
Is the PUMP token worth buying for retail investors?
33% ICO, the team holds nearly 40% of the tokens
The maximum supply of the PUMP token is 1 trillion tokens, with 33% allocated for the ICO (18% private placement + 15% public offering), 24% for the community and ecosystem, 20% for the team, and 13% for existing investors, etc. The private and public offering prices are the same at 0.004 USD, and the tokens sold in the ICO will be fully unlocked on the first trading day of July 12, while the lock-up period for the team and investors is unknown. Residents of the US and UK are unable to participate in this ICO.
Moreover, the token distribution plan has been widely criticized within the community. Cryptocurrency researcher Rex bluntly stated that its tokenomics is 'exploitative'. He pointed out that the team allocated over 40% of the token supply (20% for the team + 13% for existing investors + 2% for the foundation + 2.4% for the ecosystem fund ≈ 37.4%, plus potential control rights of some community/ecosystem funds) to itself and related parties, while the platform's income of over 750 million USD in the past year largely relied on contributions from the community.
Moreover, the unlocking rules appear to be opaque to community members. The 33% of public and private offering tokens are fully unlocked on the first day, but the lock-up terms for the team and investors' tokens are not disclosed, posing a risk of 'internal arbitrage'—using retail funds to support the market and then selling off.
Jocy, founding partner of IOSG, stated that he believes the Pump.fun team has neither the willingness nor the ability to 'pump' or 'control' the market. They have already amassed a huge fortune through fees, and this ICO seems more like a final 'exit liquidity'.
The project has no technological barriers, and its market share has been overtaken.
The Pump.fun team has indeed made a fortune solely from transaction fees.
This Meme launching platform on the Solana chain was established in 2024. According to DeFiLlama data, its peak trading volume and revenue occurred in January 2025. Currently, both trading volume and fee revenue have sharply declined. According to a post by the founding partner of IOSG Ventures on X, Pump.fun's daily revenue has plummeted over 92% after peaking at over 7 million USD on January 23, 2025, now down to about 500,000 USD.
With the temporary cooling of the Meme narrative, Pump.fun is also seeking transformation. The team recently disclosed two strategic adjustments, planning to expand the current team of fewer than 20 people to 70, covering professional areas such as engineering, compliance, and legal, and is testing its own AMM in an attempt to build a trading closed loop.
All these behaviors also confirm that the Pump.fun team has realized that as a Meme launching platform, it actually has no technological moat. Its market share has already been surpassed by another platform on Solana, LetsBonk.
All of the above shows that Pump.fun is not a unicorn in the Meme launching platform space; it lacks a technological moat and can easily be replaced.
Although Bitcoin has recently broken new highs, indeed bringing a new short-term liquidity spillover effect, Meme coins may experience a phase of recovery. However, there are too many 'zero after issuance' projects from Pump.fun, and user stickiness is actually very poor. Coupled with users' impression of the founding team making a fortune, the market may not support the PUMP token.
Moreover, its tokenomics is not friendly to retail investors, the project's launch valuation is not low, and the Meme hype is unlikely to reach its peak again, all proving that this project may not have long-term investment value.
