Pump.fun Team Unlock Reached 50 Billion PUMP in July

Crypto News

Pump.fun’s PUMP token passed a major supply milestone on July 12, when a one-year lockup expired and 82.5 billion tokens became transferable, including 50 billion allocated to the team and 32.5 billion to existing investors. At the token’s late Friday price near $0.002, the team tranche alone was worth about $102 million, equivalent to more than five months of platform revenue measured at $19.1 million for the 30 days ended July 22. The unlock followed April layoffs that remain disputed. Internal termination notices and meeting recordings described by former staff show co-founder Noah Tweedale telling employees the company had grown too quickly and could no longer move fast and rough. Severance was calculated as one week for each month worked, while unvested PUMP grants were canceled. One former employee allegedly lost an allocation now worth seven figures. In the same month, the platform burned $370 million of repurchased PUMP, removing roughly 36% of circulating supply. Co-founder Alon Cohen defended that move by arguing every unburned dollar could have been used to achieve the same result. The token initially sold at $0.004 and remains about 49% below that level, despite a daily gain near 6%. Pump.fun has not publicly answered the compensation claims.

The corporate structure behind Pump.fun is also under scrutiny. Public records at UK Companies House show Baton Corporation, the British entity tied to the platform, has not filed accounts for the period ending September 30, 2025, which were due by June 30. Late penalties start at £375, or about $505, after one month, rise to £750 after three months, and reach £1,500 after six months. Those sums are small for a protocol that has generated more than $1 billion in cumulative revenue since March 2024, but the missing filing delays public confirmation of headcount. The platform had expanded to about 100 employees before the cuts. An anonymous X account claiming to represent former staff said more than 40 people were removed in the final two months and described the process as treating workers like cattle. The account later restricted access and deleted one post, leaving the exact number unverified. Daily revenue recorded on July 22 was $764,802, up 22.6% month over month, showing activity did not collapse alongside the dispute. Other crypto firms, including Coinbase, Gemini and Block, have cut staff while citing automation and tools such as an AI trading bot, but Pump.fun’s stated rationale focused on internal pace rather than market conditions.

A second wave of allegations emerged in mid-July, centering on claims that Baton Corp dismissed about 40 employees one day before another PUMP vesting date. The assertion came from a newly created X account called ex pump employee, whose owner said they had worked at the company for more than a year and also claimed the team never intended to run a public airdrop because it opposed giving free money to users. Those statements have not been independently confirmed through employment records. On-chain data, however, shows a large distribution already took place: 57.279 billion PUMP, valued at about $86.49 million, moved to 121 wallets on July 15 as a three-year vesting schedule began. Wallet transfers do not prove immediate selling, but they increase transferable supply and can pressure markets if recipients route tokens to exchanges. The altcoin recently traded near $0.002; earlier intraday data had shown a gain near 5%, while later session figures were closer to 6%, yet the token remained about 77% below its September 2025 all-time high. Platform research covering 18.67 million launchpad tokens from January 2024 through June 2026 found 68.67% recorded their final bonding-curve trade on launch day, underscoring how quickly many creations fail. The same research excluded tokens that never traded, but the result still highlights weak durability for memecoin launches built with minimal friction.

COINOTAG’s reading is that the dispute is less about a single layoff cycle than about token-incentive governance. On-chain transfers and public registry gaps raise basic questions about insider supply, employee contracts and disclosure timing. The market backdrop is cautious: COINOTAG’s Fear and Greed Index sits at 27 out of 100, indicating fear, while Bitcoin holds 69.5% of our tracked market and the COINOTAG-tracked capitalization stands at $1,815,662,423,086. In that environment, large unlocks can amplify sentiment swings, especially for a launchpad token whose revenue remains strong but whose price is far below prior highs. Until Baton Corporation files overdue accounts and addresses the vesting claims, the record will remain split between on-chain facts and unverified allegations.