PumpFun Deposits $300M+ To Kraken

Shaw from AI16Z | Beam’s $72M Node Sale

Marco Manoppo & Karon Pangestu
January 03, 2025

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Good Morning.

Happy New Year! We saw an early New Year’s rally with AI agent tokens hitting ATH the past few days (already retracing a bit as of the time of writing). It seems to be a consensus that 2025 will STILL be the year of crypto x AI agents. But you know what they say, when things become consensus, then maybe the consensus is wrong. Crypto AI agents need to evolve, fast, to remain the top narrative in 2025.

In Today's Email:

What Matters: PumpFun Sends $300M+ to Kraken 📉
Founders Highlight: Shaw of ai16z 🤖
Deal Flow: Beam’s $72M Node Sale 💰️

You read and share. We listen and improve. Send us feedback at marco@launchy.app.

Narratives: Stagnating amrket with a few smaller pumps.

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TOGETHER WITH

Superseed

Superseed is reimagining Layer 2 technology by embedding a CDP platform directly into the protocol, enabling self-repaying loans and introducing innovative DeFi primitives:

Proof-of-Repayment: Rewards for paying down debt.
Supercollateral: Maximizing value for participants.

Superseed’s next-gen Layer 2 ensures all protocol revenue flows back to users, automatically paying off their debt and creating a more sustainable DeFi ecosystem.

The Supersale is Live:

No VC Allocations
20% of the total supply available
Fully unlocked tokens at launch

With $3.7M raised in just 10 days, early participants can still earn up to 5% in bonus tokens.

Join the Supersale now and experience the future of Layer 2 and DeFi.

WHAT MATTERS

PumpFun's Kraken Deposits Surpass $300M

Source: The Block

State of play: Pump.fun has seen a surge in deposits to Kraken, surpassing $316M in total. Despite this, activity on PumpFun has decreased significantly since reaching peak levels in November 2024

On January 1, the platform transferred 292,437 SOL (worth ~$55.5M) to Kraken, followed by an additional 63,171 SOL on January 4.
PumpFun total deposits to Kraken are 1,564,064 SOL.
It has sold over 264,000 SOL for 41.6M USDC, and its fee account holds around $2.1M in SOL.
PumpFun's daily trading volume on Raydium has fallen from a high of $2.58B in mid-November to just over $2M by January 1, 2025.
Similarly, daily revenue has dropped from $5.31M in late November to $2.12M by the start of January 2025.

Why it Matters: This decline follows a series of controversies, including mainstream attention around harmful content on its streaming feature, which led to its suspension.

What’s next: Chainalysis recently expanded its coverage of PumpFun-created tokens, citing concerns over scams and rug pulls, with some governments reportedly taking an interest in potential investigations.

For builders and investors: PumpFun is the strongest reminder that crypto’s number one PMF is still anything finance related — asset wrapping, asset rehypothecation, asset distribution, and asset issuance.

BUILDER-INVESTOR HIGHLIGHT

Shaw of ai16z

Shaw & Justin Sun

Intro: Shaw is the founder of ai16z and creator of ElizaOS. ai16z is a $2B decentralized AI-powered trading fund on the Solana blockchain that uses AI agents and community governance through a DAO to execute and optimize trading strategies.

Previous background: Shaw began his career as an anonymous developer in the AI and blockchain space. His early work focused on bridging gaps in existing ecosystems, with a particular emphasis on decentralizing data and creating autonomous systems.

The big idea: Shaw aims to create decentralized, autonomous systems that give individuals control over their data, blending blockchain and AI to enable secure, efficient ecosystems and reduce reliance on centralized institutions.

Take a peek at our referral reward at the bottom of this issue. Share this newsletter and receive our list of 500 crypto VC individuals 👇

INSIGHTS

Kekius Crashes After Musk Reverts X Name

Source: CoinGecko / The Block

State of play: The price of Kekius Maximus ($KEKIUS), an Ethereum-based memecoin, plummeted by 75% after Elon Musk reverted his X profile name back to his real name on New Year's Day.

Musk had briefly changed his profile to Kekius Maximus, fueling the memecoin's price surge from $0.01 to $0.39 and pushing its mcap from $12M to over $380M.
However, once Musk changed his name back, the coin's value dropped to $0.077, wiping out more than $300M in market cap.
Despite the sharp decline, the coin has slightly recovered, currently trading at $0.157.
Traders capitalizing on the initial surge turned a $66 investment into $3M in paper gains, while another realized a $2.3M profit.
The coin remains popular with over 24,000 holders.

DEAL FLOWS

Beam’s $72M Node Sale

Deal flows slowed down this week - we saw $99M in deals 💼

Beam has initiated a significant node sale as part of its ongoing efforts to enhance its ecosystem and engage the community. 57,959 Node Tokens have been minted, valued at $72M.

$BEAM tokens worth $52M already burned (~1.7B tokens).
The Beam node sale includes the introduction of the Horizon upgrade, transitioning the network to a permissionless proof of stake consensus mechanism.
This shift aims to democratize participation and enable users to earn rewards through Beam and partner tokens.

Deal flows in the past week:

Beam, $72M Node Sale
Nodepay, $7M Unknown Round

QUICK BITES

Do Kwon pleads not guilty to criminal charges.
Solayer gains governance token and foundation.
Tether and Bitfinex GC Stuart Hoegner retires.
IRS delays implementing crypto cost-basis reporting rules.
BlackRock's BUIDL approved as a backing token for fxUSD.
USDT sees the largest weekly mcap drop since FTX collapse.
Spot ETH ETFs logged record monthly inflows exceeding $2B.
BlackRock’s BTC ETF posts largest daily net outflows since its launch.

NOTEWORTHY READS

0xSmac’s read on 2025 macro thoughts.
Jez’s read on a starter guide to the crypto MMO.
Haseeb Qureshi’s read on 2025 crypto predictions.

One thing I still think is missing from DeFi is the ability to take out very large loans that you just don’t pay back
— Gwart (@GwartyGwart)
4:43 PM • Jan 2, 2025

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Disclaimer: All the information presented in this publication and its affiliates is strictly for educational purposes only. It should not be construed or taken as financial, legal, investment, or any other form of advice.