🟪 Meme machine

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Maybe celebrity memecoins aren’t such a good idea after all.

At some point during the $TRUMP weekend bonanza, it was posited that memecoins launched by major figures — including heads of state — were going to become the next big thing in crypto.

Well, the events of the past week, wherein the president of Argentina, Javier Milei, blew a giant hole in his reputation by promoting a pumped-and-dumped coin, may have put that thesis to bed. Check out CoinDesk’s reporting for some of the more salacious details floating around out there. 

Because of this newsletter’s cadence, I’m a bit late to the discourse here. So, I’ll try to frame my two cents here by drawing a through-line from the Hawk Tuah lady to Trump to Milei. 

See, what the past couple months have shown is that the celebrity memecoin model functions pretty simply: Anyone with a sizable social media platform can mortgage their reputation for short-term profit. Launch the coin, tweet about it, and wait for the SOL to roll in. 

The trouble is the shelf-life of these coins. If there’s been one consistent fact in the decade-old market for altcoins, it’s that the people making the real money aren’t HODLing. They dump while the getting is good — or, to be more specific, when the latecomers are bidding the market up — and move on to the next Big Thing or Big Narrative. The notion that these celebrity coins have any kind of staying power in this market is, generally speaking, a false one. There are some exceptions, sure, but for most of these coins, buyers who want to actually hang on to these coins quickly become the exit liquidity for insiders or early adopters.

I doubt the president of Argentina was planning for a memecoin with his support, explicit or otherwise, to nosedive right out the gate to the benefit of those who either knew ahead of time or happened to jump aboard the bandwagon early. But, I mean, come on — how else was it going to end? 

$TRUMP’s rise and fall gave the game away, but Milei is no Teflon Don. Milei now faces the potential of impeachment — something unlikely to happen here in the states, despite the near-comical conflict of interest Trump’s memecoin has created now that the White House is centralizing regulatory policymaking, including anything that might touch crypto. 

Just another day in crypto, I guess. 

And now, on to the roundup.

— Michael McSweeney

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With capital rotating, regulation evolving, and liquidity shifting, the smartest players are already adjusting.

• Paul Brody (EY) on where enterprises are deploying blockchain beyond the headlines.

• Ambre Soubiran (Kaiko) on the market trends that funds are acting on before retail catches up.

• Jake Chervinsky (Variant) on the legal shifts that could create—or kill—new opportunities.

• Rob Hadick (Dragonfly) on the allocation strategies driving institutional plays this year.

Some will watch. Others will act. Which side are you on?

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