Deng Tong, Golden Finance
On August 21, 2025, Kanye West announced the issuance of the coin on X, stating, 'The YEEZY token is here, a new economy based on blockchain,' along with the official website link. BitMEX co-founder Arthur Hayes also took notice of the YZY project, urging Kanye West not to 'rug' and expressing optimism about YZY's performance in a bull market.
What is the YZY project? What controversies currently exist? How do we view the phenomenon of celebrities issuing coins?
1. Overview of the YZY project
The token released by Kanye West is named YZY, and the official website explains it as 'YZY is the token that supports all transactions within YZY MONEY,' while YZY MONEY allows you to 'take control of everything without being influenced by centralized authorities.'
His post on X included a picture that appears to be his cryptocurrency address, along with a link to the official website.
After he released a video confirming the launch of YZY, the market capitalization of the YZY token briefly reached $3 billion. According to GMGN.Ai analysis platform data, the current market capitalization of the token is approximately $1.14 billion. The highest trading price was $3.23, and as of the time of writing, it has fallen to $1.1493, a decrease of 64.42% from its peak.
The official website of YZY MONEY provides specific information on YZY token economics: 20% for public issuance, 10% for the liquidity pool, 30% allocated to Yeezy Investments LLC (locked for 3 months, linear release over 24 months), 20% allocated to the team (locked for 6 months, linear release over 24 months), and 20% for the ecosystem development fund (locked for 12 months, linear release over 24 months).
YZY is minted on Solana. YZY aims to serve as an 'expression of support and participation' for the ideals represented by the symbol, rather than an investment opportunity. The YZY ecosystem includes Ye Pay (a cryptocurrency payment processor that allows merchants to accept credit card and cryptocurrency payments at lower fees) and the YZY credit card.
YZY employs an anti-sniping mechanism, deploying 25 contract addresses, and only selecting one as the official YZY token. The token's exercise plan uses Jupiter Lock—an open-source and audited protocol, divided into three parts, each with different cliff periods and a 24-month exercise period. Trading can be conducted via Meteora on Solana, and the official liquidity pool address has been announced.
2. Controversies related to YZY
1. Insider wallet arbitrage
Coinbase executive Conor Grogan stated on social media, 'I estimate that at least 94% of YZY tokens are held by insiders; 87% of the tokens are held by a single multi-signature wallet (which has now been distributed to multiple wallets); over 3% of the tokens were bought by multiple (pre-prepared) wallets through a single large transaction at market opening; over 7% of the tokens are in the liquidity pool.'
According to Lookonchain monitoring, since the launch of YZY, only YZY has been added to the liquidity pool, with no USDC. Developers can sell YZY by adding/removing liquidity, similar to LIBRA. Multiple insider wallets prepared funds in advance and immediately bought YZY after the announcement. Among them, an address starting with 6MNWV8 attempted to purchase yesterday and spent 450,611 USDC to buy 1.29 million YZY at a price of $0.35, then sold 1.04 million YZY for $1.39 million, leaving 249,907 YZY (approximately $600,000), making a profit of over $1.5 million.
In addition, an investor suspected of having token information lost $710,000 by buying the wrong YZY. Subsequently, this address bought the legitimate YZY for $761,000 and has now made a profit of over $710,000.
2. Did Kanye West really issue a coin?
As early as February this year, Kanye West stated that he would not issue cryptocurrency because these cryptocurrencies 'deceive fans through hype.' West also noted that someone had contacted him to scam on social media communities by promoting a fake cryptocurrency for $2 million.
As a result, many people do not believe that Kanye West really issued a coin and suspect that Kanye West's account was hacked. On X, many people speculate that the content of the video posted by Kanye West is AI-generated rather than recorded by Kanye West himself.
Polymarket even launched betting on whether Kanye's account was hacked.
However, the official website and his online store list YZY as a potential payment option, suggesting that the project may indeed be launched by Kanye West.
3. How to view the phenomenon of celebrity coin issuance?
The phenomenon of celebrities issuing coins has become commonplace in the cryptocurrency industry. From the President of the United States to various celebrities, there is no shortage of issuers.
On January 17, 2025, Trump announced his meme coin on social media: the TRUMP coin. After the TRUMP coin was launched, its price fluctuated significantly, opening at $0.1824, soaring over 15,000% to about $30 within 12 hours, peaking at $75.35 within 24 hours, with a market capitalization of $82 billion, before subsequently falling back.
On the second day after Trump issued his coin, his wife Melania also launched a meme coin named after herself, 'MELANIA', and their son also saw the launch of a meme coin named 'BARRON'.
In late May 2025, Olympic decathlon champion Caitlyn Jenner launched her own meme coin on the Pump.fun platform; R&B singer Jason Derulo and Sahil Arora collaborated to issue the JASON token; rapper Waka Flocka Flame also issued his own meme coin FLOCKA; Australian musician Iggy Azalea issued the token MOTHER.
Without exception, these celebrity coins have all been temporarily popular, then quickly declined. Except for the TRUMP coin, which occasionally sees significant price increases due to some actions of Trump, most celebrity coins have long vanished.
Celebrity coin issuance is all about monetizing their fame, traffic, and fans, resulting from the collision of 'attention economy' and 'hype'. Regardless of whether they are presidents or ordinary celebrities, tokens usually see a rapid surge after launch, followed by a crash. Due to a lack of actual value support, the upward trend and hype can only be fleeting.
Celebrity coin issuance first faces regulatory compliance issues. Under the U.S. regulatory framework, many celebrity coins are considered 'unregistered securities,' involving risks of 'illegal fundraising' and 'illegal issuance of token vouchers'. Secondly, most meme coins are suspected of ripping off investors, lacking actual value support and relying solely on celebrity effects to attract fans to invest, with many investors being capital harvested due to arbitrary price manipulation and dumping behaviors. Finally, the issuance of coins by celebrities involves serious speculation, which is contrary to the geek spirit of cryptocurrency technology, and it is difficult to talk about technological innovation, which is detrimental to the long-term development of the industry.
However, celebrity coin issuance is not without its merits. For instance, after Trump issued the TRUMP coin, more Americans became aware of blockchain technology and cryptocurrency and began to try to participate, which has some positive significance for enhancing public understanding of cryptocurrency.
4. Conclusion
YZY is still in the early stages; whether the project can truly succeed depends on its actual implementation. If there are no real application scenarios in the future, YZY will merely be a speculative meme coin and is destined to be lost among countless tokens. For investors, it is important to invest rationally, avoid blindly following hype, and be able to identify projects with long-term actual value.
