Crypto Still Loves Memecoins -Just Not Hunter Biden's

gm, Defiers!

These are the biggest stories in DeFi and crypto:

• Hunter Biden's LAPTOP fell 99% in three hours to TRUMP's valuation
• Pump.fun now lets creators price new coins in tokenized stocks
• Consensys is splitting in two and renaming itself MetaMask
• Bitcoin gave back its overnight gain as Brent cleared $100
• Circle is buying Singapore's Tazapay for $400 million in stock
• Oasis Vault is giving away CryptoPunk 909 (Partner)

Hunter Biden's LAPTOP opened at $247.55 and traded at $1.90 three hours later. It is now CoinGecko's worst 24-hour performer, ahead of every other token on the site.

Buyers got thin pools and team supply on the other side. The Aerodrome and Uniswap V4 books opened nearly empty, and an address Arkham tags as Wintermute sold 466,255 tokens for about $2.08 million after receiving part of a 2.5 million-token team allocation. The claim page asks for an email address rather than a wallet signature. Biden's own launch post told readers not to expect him to make the token more valuable for them, and 3.4 million people read it.

The format is doing fine. Robinhood Chain has run on memecoins quoted in tokenized equities since July, and on Wednesday afternoon Pump.fun opened the same trade on Solana with 93 quote pairs, including tokenized Nvidia, Tesla and the S&P 500, and half the fees routed into buying PUMP. What crypto turned down was another celebrity blatantly trying to profit off the space.

Read more below!

TOKENS

Hunter Biden's LAPTOP Falls 99% In Three Hours To TRUMP's Valuation

LAPTOP opened on Base at noon UTC and lost almost everything by mid-afternoon. The first five minutes closed at $247.55. Three hours later it traded at $1.90, a 99.23% fall, with the two deepest pools moving down together and Aerodrome's liquidity halving along the way.

LAPTOP and TRUMP both have one billion tokens, so the collapse left them at roughly the same valuation, near $2 billion fully diluted. TRUMP took twelve months to get there.

Thirty percent of LAPTOP's supply is tied to 30 prediction-market outcomes, the biggest being whether Trump is impeached. Founders hold another 30%. Nothing has burned and nothing has gone to charity yet.

Hunter Biden's LAPTOP Falls 99% In Three Hours To TRUMP's ValuationThe token opened on Base at 12:00 UTC, closed its first five minutes at $247.55 and traded at $1.90 three hours later, leaving both it and TRUMP near a $2 billion fully diluted valuation.thedefiant.io

Why this matters: A token that opened Wednesday morning is worth what a sitting president's token is worth after twenty months of vesting, and the mechanism paying it out has settled nothing.

DEFI

Pump.fun Lets Creators Launch Coins Priced In Tokenized Stocks

Pump.fun creators can now launch coins priced in something other than SOL or USDC. The new option, Custom Pairs, covers 93 quote assets, including tokenized Nvidia, Tesla, the S&P 500 and wrapped bitcoin. Twenty US stocks were minted for the launch by Backpack Securities.

Half the fees from those pools go to buying and burning PUMP. Creator rewards pay out in whatever the coin is paired with, so an Nvidia-quoted coin pays its creator in tokenized Nvidia.

Pump.fun promised deeper liquidity than anywhere else. The deepest book in its own pair selector held $3.07 million, and the Nvidia and Tesla books held far less. Its published fee schedule still covers only SOL and USDC pools, with no tier for a coin priced in a stock.

Why this matters: Pump.fun is importing the Robinhood Chain trade onto Solana and routing half the fees into PUMP buybacks, with no published fee tier for a pool priced in a stock.

DEFI

Consensys Software Inc. Splits In Two, Rebrands As MetaMask

Consensys is becoming two companies. The existing entity keeps the MetaMask wallet and takes its name, with co-founder Joe Lubin as chairman and chief executive. Everything institutional — the Linea layer 2, the Besu and Teku clients, the protocol engineering group — moves into a new company that keeps the Consensys name under Mike Kriak. It should be done by the end of 2026, and wallet users need to do nothing.

The two halves sell to different buyers now: consumer finance on one side, tokenization plumbing for banks on the other. Linea is the smaller business by some distance, and LINEA trades 94% below last September's high.

The announcement says nothing about the long-promised MASK token, or which company carries the IPO Consensys hired JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs to advise on.

Why this matters: Ethereum's most-used wallet and one of its largest protocol shops now answer to different boards, and the wallet side keeps the consumer revenue.

MARKETS

Bitcoin Gives Back Its Overnight Gain As Brent Tops $100

Bitcoin climbed overnight, gave it all back after the U.S. open and sat midday within $60 of Tuesday's close. Ninety-three of the 123 largest tokens fell.

Brent crude cleared $100 a barrel for the first time since July, and Zcash extended a 56% weekly run after Digital Currency Group swapped 85,705 ZEC for about $100 million of Grayscale's listed fund. Spot bitcoin ETFs took their first outflow since Sept. 1.

Traders are waiting on two inflation prints, and Polymarket now puts a quarter-point Fed increase next week at 55%.

Why this matters: August producer prices land Thursday and consumer prices Friday, the last scheduled inputs before a meeting traders now price as more likely to raise than hold.

TRADFI

Circle to Acquire Tazapay in $400 Million All-Stock Payments Deal

Circle is buying Tazapay, a Singapore cross-border payments company, for $400 million in stock. Tazapay brings more than 60 banking and fintech partners, payout rails in over 100 markets and more than $25 billion of annualized volume, most of it already moving on stablecoins.

Tazapay has been a design partner on Circle Payments Network since 2025, and the acquisition turns that partner into an owned business.

The deal needs approval from the Monetary Authority of Singapore and is expected to close in 2027.

Why this matters: Circle says it operates its payments network without moving funds itself. Buying Tazapay puts the payout rails and the banking relationships inside the company.

Other Stories Worth Your Time

Block Seeks OCC Charter for Uninsured Bitcoin and Stablecoin Custody Bank — The proposed Builders Bank & Trust would hold bitcoin and stablecoins under federal supervision without taking deposits or making loans. It joins ten other digital-asset applications waiting on the OCC.

Tenev Says Robinhood Stock Tokens Should Not Automatically Require Issuer Consent — Robinhood's tokens are debt securities issued by a Jersey entity and backed by custodied shares, so referencing a company's stock shouldn't need that company's permission, Tenev told CNBC. He confirmed holders get no votes.

Report Links $2.08M in LAPTOP Sales to Wintermute-Tagged Wallet — Lookonchain traced part of a 2.5 million-token team allocation to an address Arkham tags as Wintermute, which sold 466,255 tokens on launch day. Neither firm says what arrangement sat behind the trades.

Arbitrum Watchdog Seeks Permanent Bans For Three Grant Recipients — Good Entry, Limitless and APX Finance would be barred from all future ArbitrumDAO programs, along with their founders, over misused incentive grants. None has replied to the forum thread, and votes could open Sept. 10.

Zora Co-Founder Dee Goens Replaces Jacob Horne as CEO — Goens inherits a company under 10 people after this year's cuts, and put ZORA buybacks first on his priority list without naming a size or a date. Fees on Zora's Base deployment are down 99% from a year ago.

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