Melania Trump’s meme coin, MELANIA, has experienced a dramatic collapse in value, plummeting by 97% from its all-time high of over $13 to an all-time low of $0.38.
The token’s decline, which began after Donald Trump’s inauguration in January 2025, has raised serious concerns about insider activities and potential market manipulation within the project.
The crash appears to have been fueled by repeated heavy sell-offs linked to wallets associated with the MELANIA team.
Wave of Sell-Offs Linked to Insider Activity
On April 19, on-chain analyst EmberCN reported that nearly three million MELANIA tokens were offloaded by wallets tied to the project.
- This transaction generated approximately 9,009 SOL, valued at $1.2 million, through unilateral liquidity provisions added to the MELANIA/SOL trading pair on the Meteora platform.
- The analyst also noted that these transactions are part of a broader trend. Over the previous three days, the MELANIA team reportedly moved 7.64 million tokens, worth around $3.21 million, from liquidity and community wallets.
- The tokens were systematically added to a one-sided liquidity pool on Meteora and sold within a pre-defined price range for SOL. Out of the total, 2.95 million tokens were sold just hours before EmberCN’s report.
Long-Term Concerns and Allegations
According to EmberCN, the MELANIA project team has sold over 23 million tokens, valued at approximately $14.75 million, in the past month alone.
- These repeated sell-offs have intensified suspicions of internal dumping, first raised by blockchain analytics firm Bubblemaps in March.
- At that time, Bubblemaps detected unusual movements involving over $30 million worth of MELANIA tokens from community allocation wallets. These tokens were gradually transferred to exchanges without adequate explanation.
- The firm linked these activities to Hayden Davis, a co-founder of MELANIA, who had previously worked on the controversial LIBRA token. LIBRA briefly surged after being endorsed by Argentine President Javier Milei, only to suffer a rapid collapse shortly afterward.
Further analysis from Bubblemaps revealed that wallets associated with the MELANIA team control approximately 92% of the token’s total supply. Critics argue that such a high degree of centralization raises serious concerns about market manipulation and a lack of transparency.
Impact on Token Price and Market Sentiment
The allegations and insider activity have weighed heavily on MELANIA’s market performance.
- After its debut as a promising meme coin with a price of over $13, the token’s value has dropped to $0.38—a stunning 97% decline.
- Data from BeInCrypto confirms the token’s collapse as one of the most dramatic examples of price volatility in the cryptocurrency space.
- For its part, the MELANIA team has claimed the sell-offs were due to outdated data from their third-party anti-money laundering (AML) screening provider, which delayed updates on hacked addresses by approximately 12 hours.
The team has also defended its refusal to cooperate with Bybit, citing past reputational attacks, and criticized the broader crypto industry for “elitist policies” that they say undermine privacy-focused exchanges like MELANIA.
What you should know
In January, Melania Trump launched a cryptocurrency on the eve of her husband’s inauguration as U.S president.
- The announcement came after Donald Trump launched the $Trump cryptocurrency.
- The MELANIA token’s rapid rise and dramatic collapse emphasized broader challenges within the cryptocurrency space, such as concerns about transparency, decentralization, and insider activity.
The case also highlights ongoing debates about the balance between privacy and regulatory compliance in the industry.
As criticism mounts, the MELANIA team’s practices continue to fuel discussions about ethics, trust, and the need for robust safeguards in the volatile cryptocurrency ecosystem.
