Headline: Сооснователь Pump.fun опроверг слухи о $436 млн выводе средств, обвиняя в дезинформации Translation: Co-founder of Pump.fun refutes $436 million withdrawal rumors, accusing misinformation

The co-founder of the meme-token launch platform Pump.fun, using the pseudonym Sapijiju, has dismissed allegations of withdrawing $436 million in stablecoins to the Kraken exchange.

Initially, the transaction was highlighted by Lookonchain analysts, who noted that since October 15, the platform had transferred $436.5 million in USDC to the trading platform Kraken. Subsequently, another $537.6 million in USDC was sent directly to Circle, allegedly for cashing out.

Experts calculated that between May 19, 2024, and August 12, 2025, Pump.fun sold a total of 4.19 million SOL (approximately $757 million) at an average price of $181.

Sapijiju referred to Lookonchain’s claims as misinformation, stating that the project has no connection to the operations mentioned between Kraken and Circle.

“The current situation is part of Pump’s treasury management, where USDC from the PUMP ICO was moved to various wallets so that the company’s funds could be reinvested. We have never worked directly with Circle,” he wrote.

The fund transfers coincided with a decline in Pump.fun’s monthly revenue. The figure has consistently dropped for two consecutive months. In October, it amounted to $28.4 million, while for the incomplete month of November, it reached $19.8 million.

For comparison, the revenue in September was over $43 million.

Against this backdrop, community members speculated on the possibility of asset liquidation by the platform’s team. Among the proponents of this theory were specialists from EmberCN.

“Is the Pump.fun team withdrawing funds to purchase a villa?” they joked.

Users reacted variably to Sapijiju’s explanation. Some labeled his statements as evasive, asserting that they were left with even more questions.

“First, you deny involvement in the transactions between Kraken and Circle, and then you explain it as ‘treasury management’ through the movement of ICO funds—this is a clear contradiction. Couldn’t you avoid such discrepancies with 10 hours of preparation for the post?” wrote one user.

Another community member under the nickname EthSheepwhale completely dismissed the founder’s arguments, accusing the team of «price manipulation through airdrops» and «incompetent management that led to the token’s price falling below the ICO level.»

At the time of writing, PUMP is trading at $0.0027, which is 32% lower than its initial placement price of $0.004. The coin has also depreciated by over 70% compared to the peaks in September.

Supporters of Pump.fun took a more restrained stance. A user with the pseudonym Matty.Sol stated that the platform has the right to independently manage the income from the ICO.

The Gnosis DAO, behind the Safe, CoW Swap, Gnosis Chain, and Gnosis Pay projects, voted to terminate its contract with treasury manager KPK (formerly Karpatkey). The decision was supported by 77% of the community participants.

The termination was prompted by numerous complaints regarding high fees and unsatisfactory performance.

KPK charged 1% of the managed assets and 20% of the generated returns. Users also noted a loss of $700,000 due to a setup error in a liquidity pool on Balancer.

The former manager acknowledged issues with communication but pointed out that he reduced operational costs from $6.3 million in 2024 to $2.2 million in 2025. The company also instituted a commission cap of $2 million.

Concerns about KPK’s effectiveness had arisen in other communities as well. On Ethereum Name Service forums, participants noted that the overall return on management did not even cover the inflation rate.

Some also identified actual errors in the performance metrics provided by the company.

Recall that in September, the Scroll DAO, an L2 solution, put its operations «on pause» following the resignation of its leader.