The allure of cryptocurrencies often lies in their potential for high returns, though these outcomes come with considerable risks.
Of course, cryptocurrencies bring transformative capabilities, such as decentralizing financial systems and reshaping global transactions by removing intermediaries — but at the end of the day, it’s the promise of exponential returns that has truly captured the imagination of investors.
As the industry has matured and secured both mainstream interest and institutional adoption, instances where savvy investors turn small nest eggs into life-changing sums have become rarer — but they do still occur.
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In one such trade on November 25, an address managed to secure roughly $1.5 million in profits in just under an hour, from an initial investment of just $6,300.
Memecoin trader makes 23378% return
The initial purchase was made using 25 Solana (SOL) exchanged for roughly 297 million FRIC (FRIC), a meme coin launched by South Korean artist dricstudio, per data retrieved by Finbold from Lookonchain.
That 297 million FRIC constituted roughly 29.7 of the total circulating supply — and the SOL used to purchase it was worth $6,300 at the time of the initial transaction. Subsequently, the trader executed more than fifty sell transactions, exchanging 258 million FRIC for 4,693 Solana, worth $1.18 million at the time.
Taking into account the money initially spent on Solana, our savvy trader is up approximately $1,173,700 — in addition, they’re still in possession of some 39.08 million FRIC. When the news was initially reported, that stake was worth $380,000 — at the time of publication, prices have retreated a bit, so the value of the account’s FRIC holdings is down to $305,449.
If all of the FRIC were to be sold at the time of writing, our trader would walk away with a total of $1,479,149 — in other words, a 23,378.55% return. This, however, remains unlikely due to the liquidity issues that would arise.
Was this trader an insider or perhaps a bot?
Sudden surges in price, particularly with meme coins, represent significant risk — but they are also the very factor that makes such stellar returns possible. Not everything is always above board, however — there have been numerous instances where creators or insiders who control significant amounts of supply have pumped assets just to ‘rug’ investors and traders in short order, walking away with incredible profits while supporters and other holders are left with losses.
Purchasing almost 30% of an asset’s supply does raise some suspicions — on top of that, the address in question made more than 50 sell transactions within the span of a single hour.
Understandably, this has led to widespread assertions that the account in question is actually a trading bot — at the end of the day, it might even be a trading bot in the hands of an insider with an advantage in terms of information.
While impressive, it’s all too easy to look at these trades after the fact and ponder on them as lost opportunities — but at the end of the day, the risk profile of investing thousands of dollars into an unproven asset is simply too great for most traders.
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