Rapper Kanye West’s newly launched Yzy Token on Solana lost value of up to $3 billion just 40 minutes after its launch, but concerns over insider sales have dented most of its profits.
On Thursday’s X-Post, West, officially passing through YE, shared its contract address along with Yeezy Money’s website, which describes it as a “new economy built on the chain.”
The website describes Yzy as the currency to electricity trading within “Yzy Money.”
In a later post, West said, “The official Izzy Token just dropped.”
According to data analytics platform Nansen, the Yzy token reached a market capitalization of $3 billion within 40 minutes, but at the time of writing it had dropped to about $1.05 billion.
The fine print of the website mentions that tokens are not available to entities in restricted jurisdictions. It also warns users of risks related to digital assets, such as “possibility of complete losses.”
One user shared a screenshot and warned in February that West was asked to promote the fake currency for $2 million.
At the time of writing, West’s net worth was estimated at $400 million, according to Forbes.
Observers point out suspicions of insider trading
The Yeezy Money website has deployed 25 contract addresses for Yzy tokens and stated that it was randomly selected for official tokens to discourage the token snipers.
Still, the launch of the Yzy token, like other celebrity memokines, raised doubts over insider trading.
Onchain Analytics platform Lookonchain meant that developers could sell tokens at any time by changing the liquidity of the pool, as only Yzy tokens were added to the liquidity pool.
Coinbase director Conor Grogan noted that at least 94% of the token supply is held by insiders, and that one multi-sig wallet holds 87% of the supply before it is distributed to multiple wallets.
One user whose insider’s knowledge allegedly accidentally purchased the wrong token lost $710,000. But they later recovered their losses by purchasing the correct token, Lookonchain said.
Another user made a profit of $3.4 million and paid a $24,000 priority fee to the Solana network to ensure that transactions were processed as quickly as possible.
Onchain Lens noted that there were entities who bought the token early, which were sitting with a profit of $6 million when the token peaked.
Crypto whale, trader still buying
Despite concerns, some well-known crypto traders said they had bought the token.
Leverage trader James Wynn said whales are likely to be attracted to tokens due to their liquidity and volume.
Wynn said it was a short-term play and was trying to double or quadruple the amount poured into the token. Traders cited Mimecoin, named after President Donald Trump, who quadrupled the reason behind his investment in 28 hours.
“$yzy with a 60% drawback. $Trump ran from $4 billion to $15 billion in 28 hours. 4x.
Bitmex co-founder Arthur Hayes also apparently bought the token.
Celebrity tokens have a wide range of track record
Celebrity Mememcoin has attracted a lot of attention this year, gaining support for the Libra token, which Argentine President Javier Miley is considered to be one of the more controversial things.
Related: Mixed Arts Champion Conor McGregor launched the token
In February, the Argentine president shared a Libra token on X, which soared to a market capitalization of $4 billion. However, he removed the post after facing backlash from the community, causing the token price to collapse.
The incident sparked rage, and many called for strict restrictions on memocoin, which has been promoted by politicians.
Earlier this year, US President Donald Trump launched Trump Memocoin prior to his inauguration.
magazine: Bitcoin’s long-term security budget issues: an imminent crisis or FUD?
d
