At 4:00 AM today, pump.fun co-founder @a1lon9 joined an audio interview livestream on crypto influencer @notthreadguy‘s Twitch channel.

Before the livestream, some within English-speaking crypto communities joked that this interview was like the “FOMC” of the crypto world. In the end, the broadcast did have a dramatic effect on token price—$PUMP fell nearly 15% during the session, with a single-day drop approaching 20%, at one point dipping below a $3 billion market cap.

For pump.fun, Alon’s interview was unquestionably a public relations setback.

What Did Alon Say on the Livestream?

On the $PUMP Airdrop

threadguy: Will there still be a $PUMP airdrop? If so, when?

alon: As we promised when we announced the TGE, there will be a $PUMP airdrop. We will honor that commitment and be sure airdrop rewards go to the community members who helped us grow over the past one and a half years. Our goal is for the airdrop to be executed well, to drive overall ecosystem trading volume, and foster long-term development. That’s really important to us, and right now we’re focused on regaining attention and momentum for pump.fun. That said, the airdrop will not happen in the immediate future.

There are countless rumors about the $PUMP airdrop—how the standards or event might work—but right now, I think no more than five people in the world actually know what is planned for the $PUMP airdrop. So, all the rumors out there are unreliable. We’re incredibly serious about the airdrop and want to make sure it serves the community properly.

threadguy: How much of the $PUMP supply will be distributed via the airdrop?

alon: I can’t reveal that at this time, but the community will not be let down.

threadguy: How will you address post-airdrop sell pressure?

alon: I can’t discuss specific mechanisms yet, but we are thinking carefully about it.

On $PUMP Buybacks

threadguy: Will you continue to buy back $PUMP from the open market?

alon: I can’t share full details of our plans right now, but our on-chain actions will answer that question.

threadguy: Can you disclose how much $PUMP you’ve bought back since TGE?

alon: At first, we bought back about $20 million worth of $PUMP, and in the past four days alone, around $550,000. (Upon hearing about the $550,000 buyback over four days, threadguy remarked twice, “You guys have a lot of money!”)

On Competition from Bonk

threadguy: Why do you think Bonk was able to overtake pump.fun in volume and market share so quickly?

alon: There’s definitely a lot of short-term hype and aggressive competition, but our focus has always been on the long game. Over the past few months, there haven’t been any real product changes or genuine market growth. If this industry wants to grow by 10x or even 100x, we need fundamental change.

Long-term matters, but short-term moves are equally critical to long-term success. We’re injecting major liquidity into our ecosystem and engaging closely with community builders, to ensure those communities have the best opportunities to succeed.

threadguy: How can pump.fun reclaim absolute leadership in the “launchpad wars”?

alon: In the short term, we need to support our most active communities—those communities got us where we are. But looking further ahead, we not only need to help tokens launched on our own platform win, we need major product innovation. We all remember the explosive markets at the end of last year and start of this year. While crypto is cyclical, today’s slump can’t just be blamed on cycles—real change is necessary.

We need a better ecosystem and mechanisms to coordinate the interests of communities, creators, and traders. We need a way to bring outsiders onboard. We need memes to have constantly fresh and engaging narratives, instead of burning out the same ideas with the same people over and over. We’ve already invested a lot of time and resources in that first goal. For the second, that’s the entire purpose of the pump.fun mobile app. For the third, we’ll keep investing to attract top creators.

Let me say it again: focusing on the short term and ensuring resources flow back into pump.fun is critical to our long-term future.

threadguy: Lately you’ve bought a pump.fun ecosystem meme coin every day. Does this strategy really work long-term?

alon: It’s just a small step in our larger plan.

On the Meme Market

threadguy: Do you think the meme market will return to its former peak?

alon: Absolutely. If I didn’t see potential for the market to grow tenfold or a hundredfold, I wouldn’t be here. There’s still major upside—it’s a matter of time and action. But we need more sustainable ways to attract users. Big price surges grab attention, but the inevitable crash can drive out newcomers for good, and leave a negative impression that’s hard to overcome.

We’ll need sweeping, fundamental changes to achieve sustainable growth.

threadguy: So what are you actually going to do?

alon: To start, we’re building a broad pump.fun ecosystem—not just a single launchpad. We need talented teams. Our current team is strong, but we’ll keep recruiting, and may make strategic acquisitions like our recent Kolscan deal. We’re constantly tracking the market, looking for new growth opportunities, whether in social or other spaces.

As for major overhauls, one will be PumpSwap 2.0. I can’t share all the details yet, but the fee structure will change completely, designed to incentivize teams capable of launching more creative meme coins and building for the long run. The new CTO incentives we rolled out a week ago lay some of the groundwork, encouraging creators to build within existing meme coin communities.

We want to attract creators, streamers, artists, and startup founders into the ecosystem—not just to launch tokens for a quick hype cycle and leave, but to motivate them to build something lasting. There’s more work and iteration ahead for us to get there.

The mobile app is crucial. Even though our user numbers have wavered lately, app user counts and engagement hit new highs almost every day, giving new users a better way to join and learn about the space.

Livestreaming is also a major focal point—how can we ensure it’s the market, not social media algorithms, shaping how information spreads? That’s a big part of our long-term vision.

threadguy raised many other questions, from how pump.fun can avoid becoming the OpenSea of meme coins, to whether you’ll sign non-crypto streamers, and so on.

But ultimately, those details almost didn’t matter—the livestream ended up reigniting user anger toward pump.fun, as evidenced by the nearly 20% drop in the $PUMP price.

Why Was This a PR Disaster?

From Alon’s point of view, this probably wasn’t a PR maneuver to appease recent pump.fun controversy, but a broader outreach effort. That’s why he chose Twitch to sit down with threadguy. But in the end, holding the interview off his own platform became one more flashpoint for user frustration.

After $PUMP briefly rose post-TGE, it immediately began to slide, leaving even pump.fun supporters at a loss. Worse, Alon openly bought five ecosystem meme coins, and four of his holdings are now deep in the red.

When Alon first purchased $neet, a pump.fun ecosystem meme coin, the token briefly shot to a $30 million market cap, spiking by 365% in a single minute. Supporters thought this was a great sign, convinced that pump.fun still had the liveliest meme coin culture—its narratives would recover. But Alon didn’t keep the price rising, and the emotion-fueled buys were quickly exhausted. $neet returned to Alon’s entry price, and his subsequent meme coin purchases had less and less impact.

That made Alon’s livestream claim of “injecting significant liquidity into the ecosystem” seem not just hard to believe, but even ironic. It effectively became free advertising for competitor Bonk:

Even before the stream ended, Bonk announced they would allocate 1% of platform revenue to support their top meme coins.

News that the $PUMP airdrop wouldn’t happen soon reignited user outrage—even gainzy, a leading pump.fun streamer, vented on his own show:

Some people win, but many lose. Look at how Hyperliquid airdropped loyal users six- and seven-figure rewards—they were thrilled and kept trading there. Especially when Bitcoin hits new all-time highs, everybody wants more money. Even a small airdrop beats endless delays. With the way things are now, if the airdrop falls short, pump.fun will be under even more pressure with no easy way out.

“In the trenches,” who cares about streamers and creators? It’s the “trenches” that made pump.fun all that money. You have to let these people profit—it’s not hard to grasp.

Throughout the interview, Alon repeatedly said he couldn’t disclose specifics. At a time when user trust in pump.fun is at rock bottom, that only deepened suspicion—are you really unable to disclose details, or do you just not care after pocketing a billion dollars?

Conclusion

If Alon’s resolve, as expressed in the livestream, can only be proven over time, one thing is urgent: with $1 billion on hand, pump.fun urgently needs a world-class PR team.

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