A Solana coin creator who appears to be a teenager rug pulled holders on Tuesday evening after its token reached a market capitalization of $1 million. Stunned by $30,000 he had just pocketedthe developer knocked over everyone watching his livestream and shouted, “Thanks for the 20 bandos,” as he jumped around the room.
But Crypto Twitter took this personally and quickly took revenge.
Over the next four hours, the Pompe.fun-named thrown token Generation Quant (AS TO) skyrocketed to a peak market cap of $85 million. If the kid had kept his bag until then, his $30,000 – not $20,000 according to on-chain data, despite his comment – would have been worth more than $4 million. It’s a generational wealth failure if we’ve ever seen one.
It all started when a photo of the kid behind QUANT went viral on Monday. “I just made $2,000 before school,” the Twitter post read, from an account purportedly that of the child. “Lock up.”
Crypto Twitter apparently found this hilarious, with the initial post being viewed over 3 million times. other accounts reposted the image with their own captions. Degens marveled at the idea that a child who appears to be in his early teens could generate so much money in crypto.
That’s why when that same kid launched a token through Pump.fun two days later, he quickly caught Degens’ attention. Within 10 minutes of the launch, the developer promoted the project during a live stream as viewers and marketers joined in to watch the show.
“I believe everyone who invested in QUANT and watched the live stream, including myself, genuinely thought this could be a promising play,” said a pseudonymous trader. Nocciwho bought the token, said Decrypt. “After all, it’s not every day you see a 12-year-old win $2,000 by launching their own token. The hype was strong.
But as the token reached a market cap of $1 million, the kid quickly sold and dumped it, causing the token’s price to drop 54% in seconds. This was defined as a draw by on-chain data visualization company, Bubblemaps.
He initially appeared surprised that the coin had fallen so sharply before quickly turning around and cashing in on his newfound fortune – jumping in the air, knocking over his viewers and panicking over the gains .
This is an extension of live streaming meta which gave birth to some of the the most viral meme pieces of 2024. It all started when an alleged mother joined her son on camera to shake his tits, promising sexually suggestive acts if the token is pumped– but they held on before anything crazy could happen. This was later overcome by a man from Florida who set himself on fire to pump his coinwhich makes it hospitalized for third degree burns.
Both of these tokens disappeared shortly after the events, but QUANT was different. This time, the situation was so funny and viral that Degens started buying it.
“I wasn’t (invested) at first, but after it ended Steam, I bought some,” a pseudonymous coin trader Beezy said Decrypt“just because of how funny it all was and I saw how much popularity my tweet (about it) was gaining.”
As investors began to flood in, posts about the situation became increasingly viral, leading to popular criticism. Twitch streamer xQc reacts to it with a total of 181,000 viewers. This led the recently undervalued coin to reach a market cap of $85 million.
“It was almost like a revenge pump where people came together, fueled by the desire to get something out of the situation,” Nocci explained. “They started to buy in, create a buzz and spread the word to show that the community could make a difference after being scammed by the kid.”
While the developer may be upset about potentially wasting $1.5 million, those who invested in the project believe the token wouldn’t have worked without the child’s antics.
“His dumping was crucial, he made the story,” Beezy said. “Crypto has certainly gotten its revenge.”
The child’s lack of generational wealth was revenge enough for most people, but others went much further. Disgruntled marketers discovered the child’s true identity, leaking his address and school and spamming his apparent mother. Instagram with hateful comments.
Decrypt contacted his alleged mother and two Twitter accounts apparently linked to de,v but did not immediately receive a response.
After the mat, the child created another token called I’m sorry (SORRY), which reached a market cap of $4.5 million after selling at the $400,000 level for just over $13,000. Then another token based on his dog (LUCIE) reached a market cap of $3.8 million, after splitting its supply, selling for a value of around $20,300 when the token had a market cap of around $700,000.
“The kid didn’t do anything wrong. He never promised a long-term road map or the future of finance. It’s a coin. This is all incredibly speculative,” a pseudonymous trader SaaS Wizard—who purchased the token at a market cap of $20,000—said Decrypt. “It’s great for crypto. This is going to bring in so many new people for the bull run.
Edited by Andrew Hayward
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