Hunter Biden's "laptop" token has plunged 99% since launch-he blames "sniper" and denies making

Hunter Biden's "LAPTOP" meme coin plunged more than 99% one day after it went public.

Hunter Biden's "LAPTOP" meme coin dropped more than 99% from its all-time high just one day after it went public. The current trading price of the token is approximately US$0.77 and its market value is approximately US$275 million, a staggering drop compared with the all-time high of US$199.51 set within minutes of its launch.

Biden responded publicly on social media platform X, insisting that the crash was not a "rug pull", denied that he made a profit from it, and blamed the reasons on lack of liquidity, technical glitches and speculative traders known as "snipers."

Data behind the crash

LAPTOKEN was launched on September 9, 2026 on Coinbase's Base blockchain network. According to CoinGecko data, the token opened at around $3 and then fluctuated violently within a few minutes. Because different liquidity and timestamps are measured, top prices reported by different tracking platforms range from $190 to more than $400-a typical feature of extremely low liquidity during chaotic offerings.

Blockchain intelligence firm Arkham reported that at the absolute peak of the token, its fully diluted valuation (FDV) briefly hit a staggering $144 billion, although the actual liquidity pool supporting the price was only $48,000. This huge imbalance makes a collapse almost inevitable. Arkham pointed out that within 30 minutes, LAPTOP's FDV had dropped to about $5 billion. By the next day, the token was trading at approximately US$0.77, down more than 99% from the all-time high of US$199.51, with a market value of nearly US$275 million, and a fully diluted valuation of approximately US$787 million.

Hunter Biden's response

Biden issued a statement directly on Platform X about the crash, refuting what he considered misleading media reports.

"As you may see, LAPTOP meme experienced sharp price fluctuations during the first few hours of trading," he wrote. "The headlines are all the same: 99% drop in tokens, running away from the pool, Biden's criminal family... these allegations emerge endlessly. But this is far from the truth."

He provided a technical explanation for the crash: "The reality is that the liquidity available cannot sustain the strong market interest that was seen early in the listing. Technical problems combined with predatory 'snipers' seeking to pre-emptive liquidity providers caused prices to surge, and prices have since stabilized at healthy levels."

Biden also clearly clarified his relationship with project finance, saying that the founder's token share has been locked and not sold: "Tokens allocated by the team have been locked. No one on our side sells it, and it is impossible to sell it. I personally didn't make a penny." He noted that the fully diluted valuation was still above $1 billion and said the team was "actively seeking the best solution to optimize liquidity and continue to interact with my community."

He also defended the decision to airdrop tokens into wallets that were losing money on Trump's $TRUMP meme, saying: "Somehow, the media portrayed this as a 'failure.'"

What is LAPTOKEN? Why launch?

The token's name comes from a laptop that Hunter Biden sent to a repair shop in Delaware in April 2019-the device was later seized by the FBI and its content became the main focus of conservative media reporting on Hunter Biden before the 2020 presidential election. Biden framed the token offering as an attempt to regain ownership of the symbol that dominated news coverage that has been hostile to him for years.

According to reports from the Wall Street Journal and CoinMarketCap, LAPTOP's total supply is 1 billion tokens, 35% of which are unlocked at the token generation event, and the rest is subject to a 36-month vesting plan and cliff period. Founders, including Biden, hold 30% of the supply, lock it in for six months, and gradually vest it over two years.

Another 20% is reserved for community airdrops and distributed in two batches-target audiences include wallet addresses that previously lost money on $TRUMP meme, subscribers to Biden's Substack newsletter, and mailing lists associated with video journalist Andrew Callaghan (Callaghan himself has publicly stated that he has nothing to do with the project). The token's economic model also includes a burning mechanism linked to 30 established outcomes, one of which reportedly concerns whether the market value of LAPTOP will exceed $TRUMP.

On-chain activity raises questions

Blockchain analytics companies tracked significant activity by market makers and early holders during the crash. Arkham data shows that market maker GSR received 15.5 million tokens through intermediate addresses four days before the project went online and began distributing them shortly after the transaction began, including transfers of 9 million, 1.5 million and 500,000 tokens.

Trading company Wintermute received approximately 1.8 million to 2.5 million tokens from the project's Gnosis Safe wallet before and after the project's launch. According to data from on-chain tracker lookonchain, a wallet buying tokens for $0.40 and selling them for an average of $111 turned a $900 investment into more than $250,000 in gain-a return of up to 278 times. This illustrates how early insiders and robots profited heavily from the volatility that ordinary buyers fell into.

Community response is overwhelmingly negative

The response from cryptocurrency social media has been extremely critical, with many traders and commentators making clear that they view the issuance as a "retreat" rather than accepting Biden's liquidity-based explanation. Cryptocurrency commentator Ash Crypto wrote on X: "This is crazy... Hunter Biden's memecoin LAPTOP plunged 98% within minutes of launch. It was intended to compensate those who lost money on TRUMP coins." Another trader, Geiger Capital, posted: "Hunter Biden just launched his meme coin... fell immediately-99%. It's perfect."

Adding to the controversy, the project's official X account reportedly fell silent and was suspended after the crash, and Biden said the team was working to resolve the issue.

Future direction

With token trading prices down about 99% from their first-day highs and community trust damaged, LAPTON's survival is likely to depend on whether the project can demonstrate Biden's promised liquidity improvements and whether the locked founder shares are truly as untouched in the coming months as claimed.

For now, the incident has become one of the most volatile political meme offerings to date-even surpassing the early turmoil of Trump's own $TRUMP token-and has reignited broader scrutiny of such illiquid celebrities and the structure of political meme coins at the time of issuance.