Summary
- The LAPTOP token debuted on Base at 8 AM ET Wednesday, reaching a peak of $190.81 just two minutes later, according to Arkham, before plummeting to $3.70 within the hour.
- Initially, the token's fully diluted valuation soared to over $144 billion, despite a liquidity pool of merely $48,000, as reported by Arkham, before dropping to approximately $4.8 billion.
- This trend is typical among meme coins associated with celebrities or political figures, which usually see rapid declines.
The LAPTOP meme coin, linked to Hunter Biden's laptop controversy from the 2020 election, made its market debut Wednesday morning and followed the familiar trajectory seen in many "celebrity meme coins”: a quick surge followed by a sharp decline.
Launched on Base, which is Coinbase's Ethereum layer-2 network, the token hit the market at 8 AM ET.
According to blockchain intelligence firm Arkham, LAPTOP reached a peak of $190.81 just two minutes after its launch, suggesting a fully diluted valuation around $144 billion against a liquidity pool of only $48,000.
WAS LAPTOP AT ITS PEAK IN 2 MINUTES?
LAPTOP launched at 8:02 AM and peaked at 8:04 AM.
The FDV of the coin is currently $144B with a liquidity pool of $48K. pic.twitter.com/9yvDk6r2sB
— Arkham (@arkham) September 9, 2026
The disparity between the inflated valuation and the actual liquidity led to a swift collapse. Within 30 minutes, LAPTOP had lost nearly 90% of its value, and after one hour, it was trading around $4.77. The trading chart illustrates this pattern: a sharp rise followed by a quick reversal and a long, flat tail.
By the afternoon, the token had stabilized in the low single digits, trading around $1.97—down almost 99% from its peak but still fluctuating with thin trading, giving it a market cap of $780 million and a fully diluted valuation of $2.2 billion, placing it among the top 100 crypto assets.
On-chain analytics captured the trading dynamics in real-time. Those who sold quickly were the ones who profited from the launch. One wallet withdrew $249,800 from Binance before the launch, acquired 9,124 LAPTOP tokens, then sold most of them shortly after for approximately $1.18 million.
Myriad: How high will Bitcoin go in September? Click to make your prediction.Conversely, another trader was less fortunate. This trader invested around $200,000 to buy 919 LAPTOP tokens when the price was near $218 each, only to see their investment drop to less than $3,000 within an hour, demonstrating that timing was crucial.
Political Context and Market Sentiment
The trajectory of LAPTOP’s launch mirrors the fate of previous political meme coins. The TRUMP token, linked to former President Donald Trump, peaked at around $75 shortly after its January 2025 debut before falling to roughly $2.24, representing a decline of about 97%. Nearly a million holders collectively faced losses estimated at $3.81 billion from this token.
Similarly, Melania Trump's coin experienced a drop of more than 99% from its peak. Notably, Biden structured LAPTOP's tokenomics with this history in mind, allocating a portion of the token's airdrop for wallets that incurred losses holding TRUMP.
Decrypt had previously highlighted this scenario as a likely outcome before LAPTOP's launch, emphasizing that political and celebrity tokens often attract an initial wave of buyers regardless of public sentiment about the individual involved. However, the subsequent wave, which determines whether a token becomes a success or a failure, has often resulted in negative outcomes.
Investor Mark Cuban's assertion that every meme coin is "a rug pull in the works" reflects the skepticism that crypto traders bring to such launches.
Future Outlook
The initial trading hours followed a classic pump-and-dump model: limited supply, low liquidity, a rapid increase driven by traders and bots, followed by a crash as early investors took profits. This pattern aligns with what is visible in the chart and the on-chain data thus far, though such behavior is not unexpected and is common in many token launches.
For perspective, SpaceX (the largest IPO globally) has traded below its listing price for most of its market existence, meaning most retail investors have been at a loss since the IPO, and no trader who purchased SPCX in its first week is currently in profit.
Given this context, a token that has already seen a drop of nearly 99% from its peak has limited potential for further percentage declines. Additionally, LAPTOP's tokenomics include mechanisms such as a six-month lockup for founder tokens, a 30-event burn schedule, and staggered airdrop rounds, which will unfold over months rather than hours.
Whether the initial spike on Wednesday represents the full story or merely the opening chapter will depend on how the token performs once the initial speculative traders exit and the actual holding behavior of TRUMP-loss airdrop recipients becomes evident in the data.