Will Pump.fun’s Solana Token Pump After Launch? Experts Weigh In

Solana token launchpad Pump.fun is prepping for its initial coin offering, aka ICO, on Saturday, July 12. With U.S. and UK citizens banned from participating, traders are eagerly awaiting its full launch to purchase PUMP—but will it pump or dump once it starts trading?

The token is set to go on sale via six centralized exchanges (Bybit, Kraken, Bitget, MEXC, KuCoin, and Gate.io) as well as the Pump.fun website Saturday, with 150 billion tokens up for grabs at $0.004 each. Within 48 to 72 hours after the sale ends—once all 150 billion tokens are bought or three days pass—the PUMP tokens will become tradable.

Beanie, the pseudonymous VC at GM Capital, believes that the ICO will sell out before the three days are complete. Predictors on Myriad Market think the token sale is 70% likely to sell out within the first hour.

(Disclosure: Myriad is a prediction market developed by Decrypt’s parent company DASTAN.)

If Myriad predictors are correct, the earliest that PUMP could become tradeable and accessible for U.S. and UK users is Monday, July 14. At that point, traders will want to know if it’s worth immediately buying or waiting for a dip to scoop up some tokens.

Messari Research analyst Matthew Nay told Decrypt that he believes observing the Hyperliquid perpetual futures pre-market is the best way to predict what PUMP will do post-launch. He said it’s likely the most reliable due to its high volume.

At the time of writing, Hyperliquid’s pre-market is valuing PUMP at $0.005426—that’s a 35.65% jump from the token sale price of $0.004. The lowest it has traded was $0.00478, which is still a 19.5% increase. That’s excluding a momentary drop to $0.0038, shortly after the market was opened.

Nay said this valuation seems fair as the token may face selling pressure if the PUMP airdrop happens alongside its launch. While the airdrop date has yet to be confirmed, one source told Decrypt that the airdrop won’t happen on token launch day.

“I don’t have a specific price target, but I don’t think it will do the 3x to 4x plus as everyone is hoping,” Daniel Seager, head analyst at Trireme Trading, told Decrypt. “They [Pump.fun] have lost major market share, whilst this is neutral and can be short-term […] this can cause negative sentiment.”

Pump’s uncertain market share

Pump.fun’s token launch comes at an interesting time for the platform, which has been the dominant Solana launchpad since its January 2024 release. Up until April of this year, Pump.fun was responsible for up to 99% of meme coin creations on Solana and was as high as 92% just last month, according to Dune data.

However, over the past week, LetsBonk has seen a surge in activity, hitting a peak of 65.9% market share on Tuesday. It marked the first time that Pump.fun was flipped for daily tokens created on Solana—although it was momentarily flipped by Tron‘s SunPump last year.

“This doesn’t mean I don’t think it will perform, if you look at the tokenomics and stats, they’re actually quite favourable for long-term health and short-term price action,” Seager added, explaining that he’s met Pump.fun co-founder Alon Cohen and is “very bullish” on him as a person.

He pointed to a social media post, by pseudonymous angel investor Solarnius, that highlighted that private buyers and the team will have their tokens unlocked on a one-year cliff, meaning there will be no sell pressure from those groups until summer 2026.

Solarnius said that at a $4 billion FDV, the valuation of the token sale, the investor plans to go in as a “buyer with size” and want to get the “biggest ticket” of their life.

Beanie disagrees, calling the $4 billion valuation “unprecedented” and predicting that PUMP will trade downwards over the short term. Beanie added that the token will go “much lower” over the long term.

Purchasing at $4 billion FDV isn’t available to everyone, due to the token sale restricting those in the U.S. and UK. As a result, avid pseudonymous meme coin trader Wirelyss told Decrypt that she’ll be looking in the trenches for value.

“I think a lot of people will probably be sidelined due to the KYC and geoblocking and will go into alternative Pump-themed meme players. That’s where I’m looking,” Wirelyss explained. “$4 billion valuation sounded steep to me, considering [stablecoin issuer] Circle was valued at around $7 billion or $8 billion… Not sure they are worth half of Circle to me, though I love Pump!”