Kanye West, now officially known as Ye, has launched his own memecoin, and it’s already stirring controversy. The rapper’s new Solana-based token, YZY, exploded to a $3 billion market cap within just 40 minutes of going live — before quickly retracing after questions about insider activity began circulating.
On Thursday, Ye announced the launch in an X post, sharing the contract address and directing fans to the official Yeezy Money website. The project bills itself as “a new economy, built on-chain” and positions YZY as the native currency for transactions inside the “YZY MONEY” ecosystem. Shortly after, Ye posted again, confirming: “the official YZY token just dropped.”
But the early excitement didn’t last long. Data from Nansen shows the coin’s valuation sinking to roughly $1.05 billion shortly after the initial surge.
The website’s disclaimer highlights that the token isn’t available in restricted regions and warns users of the risks, including the possibility of a “complete loss.” Notably, West previously revealed that he was offered $2 million earlier this year to push a fake coin — a scam proposal he declined.
At launch, YZY’s structure raised eyebrows. The team claimed to deploy 25 different contract addresses, selecting one randomly to discourage bots. However, blockchain sleuths spotted red flags. According to Lookonchain, developers only added YZY tokens (not liquidity pairs) to the pool, giving them power to pull liquidity whenever they wished. Coinbase director Conor Grogan added that 94% of the supply was insider-controlled, with a single multisig wallet holding 87% before dispersing funds across other wallets.
The aftermath produced some dramatic wins and losses. One insider reportedly lost $710K after mistakenly buying the wrong token but later recovered by entering the correct one. Another trader pocketed $3.4M, paying hefty Solana priority fees to get their transaction confirmed instantly. An early whale, according to Onchain Lens, saw unrealized profits hit $6M during YZY’s brief peak.
Despite the backlash, major traders still piled in. Leverage trader James Wynn argued that whales would be attracted by the token’s sheer liquidity and compared YZY’s potential to President Donald Trump’s memecoin, which quadrupled in under 30 hours. “Aped $YZY on a 60% pullback,” Wynn wrote, adding, “$TRUMP ran from $4B to $15B in 28 hours. 4x.”
Even Arthur Hayes, co-founder of BitMEX, appeared to have joined in.
Celebrity-backed tokens are far from new — but they’ve had mixed outcomes. Argentina’s President Javier Milei briefly boosted the LIBRA token earlier this year, sending it to a $4B valuation before deleting his post after community backlash tanked the price. In the U.S., President Donald Trump launched his own TRUMP token ahead of his inauguration, sparking a frenzy in the memecoin sector.
Whether Kanye’s YZY coin can survive beyond its explosive debut remains uncertain — but for now, it has cemented its place among the most talked-about celebrity memecoin launches of the year.
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