As PEPE prices recover after a 76% slump from May 2023 peaks, a trader holding over $10 million worth of Pepe Coin (PEPE) and Milady Meme Coin (LADYS) meme tokens can, reportedly, not sell as both projects have blacklisted his addresses.
Striking Gold On PEPE And LADYS
Data from Scope Protocol, an analytics platform, shows that the anonymous trader was among the earliest buyers of PEPE and LADYS meme tokens.
Imagine you are profit $10M but can't sell.
0xaf23 is blacklisted by both $PEPE & $LADYS because bought too early.
he bought 2.52T $PEPE with 0.013 ETH, now these $PEPE worth ~$4.6M
he also bought 290T $LADYS (33% of all) and holds 71T now (~4.9M).https://t.co/XzsxRdAMCY pic.twitter.com/7rWZnw6oMQ
— 0xScope ( . ) (@ScopeProtocol) May 11, 2023
The two meme projects have experienced a tremendous surge, catapulting early holders into the realm of millionaires.
Records show that the trader acquired 2.52 trillion PEPE tokens for just 0.013 ETH. His stash grew to $4.6 million.
The trader also bought 290 trillion LADY tokens, or about 33% of the total supply.
As of May 11, the blacklisted address held roughly 71 trillion LADY worth over $4.9 million.
Yet, with the two projects blocking his addresses, the trader cannot liquidate and profit.
Unconfirmed rumors have it that the trader is associated with a maximal extractable value (MEV) bot.
Despite this setback, the inability of the trader to sell their PEPE and LADYS tokens could support prices considering the amount held by the trader. A block sell could adversely impact liquidity.
The surge of PEPE, though without any utility, points to the community’s greed, and unwillingness to miss out due to FOMO.
MEV Bots Raise Concerns
Concerns about the impact of MEV bots on Ethereum’s security and fairness have grown, as they can impact gas fees, front-run transactions, and congest the network especially as the meme token craze continues.
The blacklisting of the trader’s addresses suspected of being MEV bots coincides with PEPE and LADYS spike in trading activity on Ethereum.
An example is a notorious MEV bot named Jaredfromsubway.eth that’s sandwiching meme token traders for profit. Because of the number of trading done amid the meme token craze, the bot is one of the biggest contributors of the high fees in Ethereum.
As trading volumes of meme tokens rise, more bots will likely be deployed to profit from this popularity.
Already, CoinMarketCap data on May 14 shows that PEPE’s average daily volumes stood at over $520 million which is almost the same as its market cap at $721 million. Meanwhile, LADYS daily volumes reached $74 million as its total market cap rose 30% to $80 million.
There were also signs of suspicious activities and addresses in the LADY token ecosystem which previously raised some concerns.
Nine addresses transferred 26 trillion LADYS, equivalent to $3.7 million, to exchanges. Earlier, these addresses received ETH from KuCoin simultaneously before buying LADYS.
If you notice these suspicious addresses, then you can predict the drop of $LADYS in advance.
9 addresses transferred a total of 26T $LADYS ($3.7M) to exchanges.
Is it a coincidence that the price of $LADYS drops after each transfer?https://t.co/isFU2u9zVK pic.twitter.com/uoa8tBFWUA
— Lookonchain (@lookonchain) May 12, 2023
Furthermore, they transferred all of their holdings to new addresses. Interestingly, each transfer coincides with a drop in the price of LADYS.
Users were advised to watch these whale accounts as their activities could impact prices.
If you bought $LADYS, you should pay attention to these 42 suspicious addresses.
They hold 205T $LADYS ($19M), 23% of the total supply.
They all received $ETH from #KuCoin at the same time and bought $LADYS.
And also transferred all $LADYS to new addresses 10 hrs ago. pic.twitter.com/EftRtfRZD7
— Lookonchain (@lookonchain) May 11, 2023