Solana on-chain memecoin issuance platform landscape changes dramatically

"The king is dead, long live the king."

This declaration echoed in the Palace of Versailles in the 18th century. Louis XV had just passed away, and the once-submissive nobles quickly turned to the next king. This was not cold-bloodedness, but a manifestation of survival instinct.

The French deeply understand the nature of power: power never belongs to individuals; it flows like water, always seeking new containers. This statement is not a lament for the deceased but an acknowledgment of the new king's rule. Former monarchs may quickly become footnotes in history. The transition of power comes swiftly, ruthlessly, and inevitably.

Power requires this ruthlessness. Empires rise on the foundations laid by their predecessors, and new rulers inherit the old thrones, in a cycle that repeats. Today, the memecoin issuance platform on the Solana blockchain is staging a modern version of this ancient ritual.

Once the dominant player Pump.fun held 88% of the market share a month ago, but now it has only 13% left. The emerging challenger Let'sBONK has taken 86% of the market.

This is not just another manifestation of volatility in the crypto world, but a typical case of the collapse of an empire: when the key moat of attention is overlooked, even the greatest first-mover advantage can vanish in an instant.

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The Rise and Fall of the Pump.fun Empire

To understand the decline of Pump.fun, one must first understand its former glory. In January 2024, three young people in their 20s launched this platform, overturning the issuance logic of meme coins with a single sentence: "Upload an image, name it, click a few times, and you can issue a coin for less than $2, without any programming."

It satisfies a fundamental impulse to turn "valueless" into "valuable." In the crypto world, this is not a fantasy but a business model. By January 2025, Pump.fun generated over $458 million in revenue, launching thousands of new coins daily, with peak daily revenue exceeding $7 million.

More importantly, it has won the attention battlefield and become synonymous with Solana memecoin culture. On Crypto Twitter, issuing tokens is almost equivalent to using Pump.fun. It not only occupies the infrastructure but also dominates the cultural discourse.

However, the tragedy began with one of its most "innovative" features: live streaming. Originally intended to provide a promotional platform for issuers, things quickly spiraled out of control. Starting in November 2024, in a bid for attention, some began to engage in extreme behaviors during live broadcasts: simulating self-harm, threatening suicide, and abusing animals. The most serious incident involved a minor user threatening family members with a gun on camera, all to inflate the coin's price.

Pump.fun was forced to urgently shut down its live streaming feature, but its reputation has already been severely damaged. Weekly revenue plummeted by 66%, public opinion turned against it, and competitors began to take advantage of the situation. Faced with declining revenue and competitive pressure, Pump.fun made a decision that seemed wise but was actually fatal: to save itself through an ICO.

This ICO can be considered a technical success—raising $500 million from over 10,000 wallets in just 12 minutes, along with $700 million from private placements. However, a deeper analysis reveals some issues: over 200 wallets hit the $1 million cap, with the top 340 buyers accounting for 60% of the shares. All sold tokens are fully unlocked, with only a transfer restriction period set for 48 to 72 hours.

Nearly half of the participants only funded their wallets within 24 hours, which may suggest an organized purchasing strategy or reflect strong interest from retail users in this issuance.

The token price initially rose by 75% to $0.007, but enthusiasm quickly faded. It fell by 60% within weeks, constantly hitting new lows, exhibiting a typical "death spiral" trend. The tokenomics design is also very aggressive, with only 33% allocated to public and private offerings, while the remaining 67% is controlled by the project team, and the allocation timeline is unclear. Of this 33%, 18% is specifically reserved for private placement shares for institutional investors.

Despite users generating nearly $750 million in revenue for the platform, there are no immediate community rewards; meanwhile, private investors have sold tokens worth $160 million to the exchange, creating significant selling pressure.

The final blow was the co-founders' public announcement that the long-promised airdrop "will not happen in the foreseeable future." For months, the project had hinted that the upcoming rewards "would be more generous than anyone in the industry," creating huge market expectations. At the moment when community trust was most fragile, the decision to cancel the airdrop led to a 15% drop in token prices within 24 hours. The issue is not the importance of the airdrop itself, but the fatal blow caused by breaking promises.

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The Rise of Let'sBONK

When Pump.fun keeps hitting landmines, Let'sBONK is quietly building the elements that competitors lack: transparency, community orientation, and clear communication.

Currently, Let'sBONK's daily revenue has reached $1.3 million, which is 5 times that of Pump.fun. Annualized, Let'sBONK's monthly revenue amounts to $434.92 million, while Pump.fun stands at $267.25 million.

From almost zero in May to a stable daily income of over one million dollars in July, Let'sBONK's revenue has been steadily increasing. In contrast, Pump.fun's income plummeted from a peak of over 7 million dollars in January back to the levels seen in September 2024.

Since the ICO, the market value of the PUMP token has evaporated by 60%, while BONK remains relatively stable with a market value of 2.1 billion dollars. Let'sBONK allocates 1% of its weekly revenue to buy back BONK, supporting this ecological token that predates the platform and has an existing foundation.

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The Game of Attention Economy

Pump.fun once seized the opportunity through network effects—developers issued tokens there because traders were there; traders were there because the hottest memecoins were launched there. This flywheel effect seems unstoppable.

But attention is fragile. It differs from the traditional business moats—economies of scale, switching costs, regulatory barriers—once trust collapses, the users' mindset can disintegrate in an instant. A live streaming incident gave users a reason to try alternative platforms. Let'sBONK immediately became the "clean" choice, a new platform with no historical baggage.

It's like how Myspace lost to Facebook back in the day. Myspace had features and scale, but lost the cultural narrative. Facebook became the platform for "real users," while Myspace became synonymous with spam, chaotic interfaces, and marginalization.

After realizing the crisis of life and death, Pump.fun launched a nearly desperate counterattack. First, they raised the token buyback ratio from 25% of daily revenue to 100%. Although this means about $254,000 is used for buybacks daily, far exceeding Let'sBONK's daily buyback of $13,000 (only 1%), it also represents that Pump.fun is using all its revenue for buybacks rather than for platform growth.

Secondly, they launched a 30-day incentive program that rewards PUMP tokens based on trading activity. However, initial feedback indicates that this strategy has not reversed the competitive landscape.

The problem lies not at the tactical level, but at the strategic level. No amount of buybacks or incentive plans can restore lost trust, nor can they refocus the attention of users who have already shifted their focus.

The reward mechanism of Pump.fun revolves solely around trading volume, while Let'sBONK has built a truly user-interest-aligned ecological reward system.

The BONK reward program allows users to lock in funds for 6 to 12 months, receiving a proportional share of the revenue generated by the product ecosystem. The longer the lock-in period, the higher the multiplier. The better the product performance, the more rewards users receive. This is not about "paying for people to trade", but rather "paying to let users co-build".

Users (including project parties) can obtain "Bonk Points" through trading, purchasing, or issuance of tokens. These points are expected to be redeemable for physical goods or rights in the future, further incentivizing active participation. The gamified growth experience makes users feel that they are participating in a larger mission.

While Pump.fun is still exploring ICOs and experiencing delays in airdrop fulfillment, Let'sBONK has already provided a structured reward system for core users. In the crypto world, capital will always flow towards better incentive mechanisms.

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A Larger Perspective

In traditional industries, market leaders often hold their positions for decades. General Motors dominated automobile manufacturing for half a century, while IBM controlled enterprise computing for almost as long. However, in digital markets, the cost of switching for users is close to zero, and a dominant position can vanish within a few months.

Does Pump.fun still have a chance to turn things around? Although its market share has significantly shrunk, it hasn't reached the point of being out of the game yet.

They do have some advantages: the 1.2 billion dollars in financing has bought them time and provided them with the capital to experiment and outlast competitors. Their platform has supported hundreds of thousands of project issuances without crashing—this is especially important in an environment where other new platforms are prone to fail under pressure. Even with a decline in market share, they still generate over 250,000 dollars in daily revenue, with an annualized figure close to 100 million dollars, plus a massive capital reserve, so they are still on solid ground.

They are the pioneers of this category. Transforming token issuance from programming into a few clicks of the mouse has earned them lasting brand recognition. The first-mover advantage doesn't just disappear.

Recent actions also indicate that they have not given up: Pump.fun 2.0 has added real-time data updates and one-click trading; the buyback ratio has increased to 100%; user incentives have been launched. These are not signs of surrender, but rather a counterattack.

The most likely scenario is not a complete collapse, but rather market fragmentation. There are rarely permanent monopolists in the crypto space. More likely, Let'sBONK will become the major platform, dominating the issuance and revenue of tokens, while Pump.fun transforms into a niche platform with loyal users, securing a place with its interface, features, or ecosystem.

But to truly turn the tide, Pump.fun must not only solve technical issues or rely on financial incentives to retain users, but also rebuild trust and reclaim cultural high ground. This means achieving an open and transparent, community-centered token economic structure, and it may even require a complete overhaul of the leadership to thoroughly break away from past controversies.

The French court has long understood a principle: when a king loses legitimacy, no amount of gold and silver or ceremony can restore dignity. Only a new ruler can earn the old respect. Sometimes, for the continuation of the kingdom, the crown must be passed to a newcomer.

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