Quick Takeaways
- $24M profit was made by just 13 sniper wallets, while retail traders lost millions.
- YZY Memecoin crashed 74% within a day, right after a 1,400% spike.
- Insiders likely coordinated, just like they did in other celeb coin scandals.
YZY Memecoin Launch: Insiders Win, Everyone Else Gets Burned
Kanye West’s newly launched YZY Memecoin made headlines for all the wrong reasons. Sure, it exploded 1,400% within the first hour, but the hype didn’t last long. What looked like a golden opportunity for retail investors quickly turned into a classic crypto trap.
Instead of helping fans or average crypto traders get in early, the launch seemed built for snipers and insiders. Only 13 wallets took home more than $24 million in profits, according to Nansen data.
It is more than $ 1 million in less than a day, while thousands of small investors were left holding the bag.
Inside the YZY Memecoin Crash: What the Data Really Shows
As the dust settled, things got ugly. YZY’s price dropped 74% within 24 hours of its peak, sinking from $3 to around $0.77.
One unlucky wallet realized a loss of $1.8 million, while another took a hit of $1.2 million. And at least one wallet is still holding, sitting on an unrealized $800K loss—ouch.
But here’s where it gets worse.
Only 9 out of the first 99 buyers still have any YZY left. That’s a clear sign that most early buyers were never planning to hold long-term. Instead, it looks like a coordinated exit.
Bubblemaps, a blockchain data platform, flagged the first buyer of YZY as a well-known “sniper” who also made millions off the Trump memecoin. Not only that, but this wallet was linked to another sniper someone they’ve worked with before on similar schemes.
In short: this wasn’t just lucky trading. It was strategic, calculated, and possibly planned before the coin even hit the market.
“An elite gang of snipers creates millions of damaging charts by coordinating instead of competing,” Bubblemaps revealed.
YZY Memecoin Isn’t the First Celebrity Crypto Disaster
It’s true if this seems familiar to you.
Celebrity memecoins have been popping up non-stop this year, and most of them follow a similar pattern: launch with big hype, pump quickly, anddump hard. And every time, it’s the same story: insiders get rich, and regular people lose money.
Based on her popular “Hawk Tuah” catchphrase, TikTok sensation Hailey Welch created HAWK a few months ago. It pumped fast, dumped faster, and insiders walked away with $3 million. Sound familiar?
Other celebrities like Iggi Azalia, Lindsay Lohan and Cattyin Jenner have also been implicated in Memcoin drama. For marketing a token without revealing her payment, Kim Kardashian even received a fine from the SEC.
Crypto OG Arthur Hayes said it best:
“Oopsi … next time the fame did not let me trade the businessman like Yzy. Just two-steepin should have been kept.”
What Can You Actually Learn from the YZY Memecoin Mess?
So what’s the real takeaway from all this?
If you’re jumping into celebrity-backed coins hoping for quick gains, remember someone else might already be planning their exit before you even click “Buy.”
Especially when insiders are sniping early and dumping before the public gets in.
Here are three hard truths from the YZY Memecoin chaos:
- A small group of wallets made millions, while most retail traders lost big.
- The same snipers show up across multiple memecoin launches, often working together.
- YZY is just the latest in a growing pattern of celebrity-backed pump-and-dumps.
That said, not all hope is lost. On-chain tools like Nansen and Dune Analytics can help you analyze wallet behavior before you jump into the next hot token.
They might not prevent every loss, but they can definitely help you spot red flags early.
Blockchain investigator “Dethtective” nailed it in a recent post:
“These celebrity coins are usually described as a way to onboard people. For me, it looks like a transfer of money that makes the rich even more rich.”
