How A PEPE Trader Reaped Over 15,000x Profit Amidst Meme Coin Mania

Is the memecoin season really back?

One savvy trader has made headlines after raking in millions of dollars in profit in the span of a year with Pepe-the-Frog-themed memecoin (PEPE). The investor transformed a $3K investment in PEPE into a whopping $4.6 million windfall. This comes as the price of Pepe recently set a new lifetime peak following a renewed GameStop frenzy.

Turning $3K Into $4.6M With PEPE

In a May 15 post on X (aka Twitter), on-chain analytics platform Lookonchain shared how one crypto trader turned their $3,000 investment into millions of dollars. The unknown trader purchased $4.9 trillion PEPE tokens for $3,000 on April 15, 2023, which is when the meme coin went live.

PEPE would then experience a meteoric upsurge that year, climbing from below a $1 million market cap to over $1 billion after being listed on top crypto exchanges like Binance. At this point, the trader’s Pepe stockpile had increased to over $10 million. 

Fast forward to 2024, the Ethereum meme coin has popped higher. Pepe recently hit a new all-time high of $0.00001151 on the back of a viral social media post by retail trader Keith Gill, whose posts led to the GameStop short squeeze of 2021. Gill, who turned $58,000 into roughly $50 million between 2019 and 2021 by trading GameStop options, triggered a sudden rally in the stock and other memes after posting on his X account for the first time after a three-year hiatus.

According to CoinGecko, Pepe is now the third-largest coin in the meme category. The crypto trader started taking some profits following PEPE’s historic move to new ATHs. According to Lookonchain data, the trader has sold 1.41 trillion PEPE tokens for $7.4 million so far. What remains—3.5 trillion PEPE—is now valued at $38.9 million.

Overall, the trader has enjoyed a staggering 15,718-fold return on his initial $3K investment. As of this writing, their total realized and unrealized profit from this single trade now stands at approximately $46.3 million. This kind of return is symbolic of the volatility and opportunity within the crypto meme coin sector.

Insider Trading?

The anonymous trader’s purchase of PEPE right after its launch has sparked speculation of whether they are insiders.

However, some crypto spectators on X pointed to the determination and optimism it took the investor to hold their stash for a whole year. According to them, the PEPE trader made such spectacular returns as they did not sell early.

Meanwhile, there are unconfirmed rumors that Coinbase is preparing to launch spot PEPE trading. If true, the frog-themed meme coin could be poised to rocket to new highs.