Celebs join the latest crypto craze (again) by promoting memecoins

Messy marketing… Between Copa América games, Lionel Messi recently appeared to promote a memecoin to his half-billion Instagram followers. The coin’s price 4x’d after Messi’s post. The soccer icon’s just the latest celeb to endorse memecoins, highly speculative crypto tokens that tend to thrive on online hype and community. Caitlyn Jenner, Jason Derulo, and rapper Rich the Kid have all launched memecoins, which are down about 40 to 90% from their peaks. They and other celebs have said they were lured into promoting coins that Rich the Kid called “pump and dump” schemes. Other stars have denied involvement in memecoins linked to them:

• Kiss me less: Last week fans poured funds into “Doja” coins after artist Doja Cat’s X account posted about them — only for the singer to say she’d been hacked. Hulk Hogan also told his followers to disregard posts that his account is said to have made promoting “Hulk” coins.

The new trend on the block… Nearly half a million memecoins were minted on the Solana blockchain in May, and celebs hopped on the trend. It’s not their first crypto go-round. In 2017, when bitcoin’s value 20x’d, public figures like Paris Hilton and Jamie Foxx promoted new coins launching on the blockchain, aka “initial coin offerings.” Then, around 2021 (the same year a “Bored Ape” NFT sold for $3.4M) to 2022, Jake Paul, DJ Khaled, and David Dobrik promoted NFTs that turned out to be “rug pulls” (meaning the project’s creators vanished after taking investors’ money).

• Pushback: Some view celeb attention as a sign that a crypto trend has already peaked. Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin said he’s “quite unhappy” with celebs’ memecoin moves, saying their sole purpose is to make money rather than fund worthy causes.