Hunter Biden’s LAPTOP airdrops briefly worth over $1 million each before 99% crash

Hunter Biden's newly launched LAPTOP memecoin had a wild first hour of trading on Wednesday, briefly reaching a market capitalization of around $110 billion before crashing more than 99%.

The Base-based token began trading shortly after 8 a.m. ET and quickly climbed to more than $300 per token, according to DexScreener data, before giving back virtually all its gains in a matter of minutes.

Some of the biggest potential beneficiaries of the surge didn't even have to buy the token. As part of LAPTOP's previously announced tokenomics, 10% of its 1 billion-token supply was set aside for an initial community airdrop. Biden specifically said that anyone subscribed to his Substack before Sept. 6 would be "eligible to receive free tokens."

Onchain data shows that Substack subscribers were able to claim 4,276 LAPTOP tokens each. At its roughly $300 peak, that would have given each allocation a paper value of nearly $1.3 million.

But realizing anything close to that would have been nearly impossible given the token's thin liquidity and short-lived peak. However, even hours after the crash, at a price of around $2, subscribers could still turn their allocation into an easy $8,000.

Fresh onchain data from Bubblemaps also claims that more than 80% of wallets that bought the token were in the red following the launch, representing over 11,500 wallets that bought the token. Bubblemaps also found that many of LAPTOP’s largest holders had little or no prior onchain history. Roughly 60% of the top holders were fresh wallets funded within the past 10 days, with most receiving their initial funding on Wednesday, the firm said.

'Giving back'

The launch comes after Biden pitched LAPTOP as a memecoin "built around resilience, redemption, and recovery" and as a way to give back to his supporters.

He also criticized the wave of political memecoins launched over the past two years, taking a jab at President Donald Trump's memecoin and reserving 2% of LAPTOP’s total supply for traders who lost money on TRUMP.

Thirty percent of the supply is allocated to founders, including Biden, but those tokens are locked for six months and vest over 24 months. Another 30% is tied to a series of real-world predictions, with tokens either burned or donated to charity depending on their outcomes.