On Oct. 22, trader Kimchi’s account posted a Project Kimchi poster with a QR code that opened a Pump.fun token, and Pump.fun co-founder Alon reposted it. The token’s market cap peaked near $15 million before falling more than 98% to about $284,000 in one snapshot. Alon later removed his repost, and traders said the QR code no longer pointed to the token.
Early reports said Kimchi’s account had been hacked, but investigators questioned that account. Neither Kimchi nor Pump.fun had issued a statement at the time of writing, so the circumstances of the launch remained unclear. Separately, Bubblemaps estimated about $6 million in profit from Kimchi’s linked TRUMP-token wallets, against his $40 million claim; it said its trace covered only part of the wallet cluster.
