Solana-based “sol” (CAT) meme coin crashed heavily on Monday following a recent analysis by crypto detective ZachXBT connecting its team to the X account hack of crypto analyst GCRClassic.
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In an analysis on X on Monday, ZachXBT accused the CAT meme coin team of carrying out a sniping attack on their own project and using the proceeds to launch a pump-and-dump scheme via GCRClassic's account.
Sniping attack in this context refers to a fraudulent practice where insiders buy large holdings of a project before it’s available to the public only to dump the coin after it begins trading.
He started his analysis by citing a post from Lookonchain stating that an insider created new wallets to snipe 632 million CAT — 65% of its supply — using 1,370 SOL worth $230,000. The insider later dumped $5 million worth of CAT and transferred parts of the profits to crypto exchanges Kucoin and MEXC.
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After several strategies to hide their trail, the insiders transferred funds to decentralized perpetual exchange Hyperliquid and opened $2.3 million worth of ORDI long positions. Around the same time, compromised GCRClassic account released a post shilling for ORDI, causing the price to spike. The insiders quickly booked profits of $34,000 before GCRClassic made a post from another account confirming the original X account was hacked.
However, that didn't stop the hackers who made another post shilling ETHFI after opening long positions of $1 million worth of ETHFI on Hyperliquid.
"People let a scammer farm them for 7 figs just bc they purchased an expensive username and made mysterious posts," said ZachXBT.
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He also alleged that most meme coins are often manipulated as phishing scammers have increasingly switched to becoming meme coin scammers.
After the accusations, CAT suffered a sharp decline, crashing nearly 70% in the past 24 hours.
CAT's team hasn't responded to a request to comment on ZachXBT's accusations.