Hunter Biden Lashes Out After LAPTOP Meme Coin Collapse
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What happened
Hunter Biden, son of former President Joe Biden, launched a cryptocurrency token named $LAPTOP this week on Base, the blockchain developed by Coinbase. On Wednesday, the token’s quoted price briefly rose above $300 before falling to a few dollars within hours, a drop of more than 99 percent from that peak. Blockchain analysis by Datavault AI found that one trader spent about $250,000 to buy 9,124 tokens and sold 8,480 of them minutes later for about $1.18 million, while a buyer who put roughly $200,000 in near the peak was left with a holding worth about $2,000; Bubblemaps estimated that about 80 percent of launch-day buyers lost money across more than 15,000 wallets. On Friday, Biden posted a video on X saying the project’s market maker supplied only $5,000 of liquidity at launch, which he said caused the spike, and he stated that he and his partners have not sold tokens because of a six-month lockup. He called the launch his responsibility, said he would stay with the project, and promised to “make it right,” without describing any compensation for buyers.
Sourcing check · Fully on the record · 3 articles
3 of 3 articles cite a named source for the story. It was on the record from the first report.
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- On the record means the article cites a source by name for the story's main claim: a person, or an institution speaking officially, such as a company statement or a named agency's spokesperson. The opposite is an unnamed source. The count is how many of the counted articles cite at least one such source; the names are everyone named across them, each once however the articles spell it. Here: Nathaniel Bradley, Hunter Biden, Datavault AI and Bubblemaps
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- Primary evidence means the article cites a record you could check yourself: a court filing or ruling, a dataset or report, a recording or transcript, an official statement or press release, market data. A quote is not a document. The count is how many articles cite one. Here: blockchain analysis
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- When the first report landed and whether it named anyone; when the first named source and the first document appeared. Here: First report Sep 10, 10:00 UTC by New York Post, naming its source. First document in the first report, from New York Post (blockchain analysis).
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This is about who is cited, not whether the story is true. Each source below says what it names. How we count
BLINDSPOT.
Only right-leaning outlets are covering this story
— the other side's media is silent.
Omitted — what each side leaves out
Unpacked
Left-leaning coverage has not reported the collapse of Hunter Biden's meme coin, a launch-day crash in which most buyers lost money while one unidentified trader booked a large gain. Right-leaning coverage documents the wipeout, including estimates that four-fifths of launch-day buyers finished in the red. A reader of the silent side would not know the token existed or that Biden later took public responsibility for the failure.
Right-leaning outlets do not agree among themselves on what the crash was. The debut was branded a "classic rug pull" even as that New York Post reporting states there has been no finding of fraud. Biden's later explanation, carried by Fox Business, is that a market maker supplied far too little cash to handle demand.
Was the mystery trader who sold into the spike connected to the project?
Bottom line
A mystery trader made about $930,000 in minutes on Hunter Biden's meme coin, the New York Post reported, and left-leaning outlets have not covered the launch.
The receipts — 6 facts one side's coverage lacks
- Four out of five people who bought $LAPTOP on launch day lost money
- One trader turned about $250,000 into $1.18 million within minutes
- No finding that Biden or the project engaged in fraud, and analysis has not established that Biden sold tokens during the collapse
- Biden said the market maker put in only $5,000 of liquidity in the first 30 seconds
- Founders including Biden were slated to receive 30% of a 1 billion-token supply, locked for six months
- A buyer who put roughly $200,000 in near the peak was left with a position worth about $2,000
The Right View
The New York Post and Fox Business reported that four out of five people who bought $LAPTOP on launch day lost money while one unidentified trader turned a roughly $250,000 purchase into about $1.18 million within minutes. Both outlets highlighted Datavault AI CEO Nathaniel Bradley’s description of the debut as a “classic rug pull” and, in The Post, his view that calling the token worth $300 was fraudulent, while also stating there has been no finding of fraud and that Datavault had not shown Biden himself sold during the collapse. They framed Biden’s Friday video as an angry account blaming a $5,000 liquidity pool for a brief valuation he compared to exceeding BlackRock’s market cap, and they noted he did not address the mystery trader’s gain or ordinary buyers’ losses. Coverage tied the token’s name to The Post’s 2020 laptop reporting and quoted Altcoin Pro’s Joni Zhuleku saying a $5,000 pool could produce a huge quoted-price spike but that a 99 percent drop from the high does not show the project has the situation under control.
Our Take (balanced)
The story is substantive: it rests on a named public figure, a specific token launch, recorded prices, wallet-level figures from Datavault AI and Bubblemaps, and Biden’s own video. Established facts are that $LAPTOP launched this week on Base, spiked then fell more than 99 percent from its intra-day high, that analytics firms reported a large one-trader profit and majority launch-day losses, that founder tokens were described as locked for six months, and that Biden publicly blamed a market-maker liquidity shortfall and said he and partners have not sold. Not established is fraud or a rug pull by Biden or the project; there is no finding that he or other principals sold into the spike, and any personal proceeds remain unknown. No left-leaning outlet has reported this. Watch next for completed on-chain tracing of founder and market-maker wallets, any concrete plan to compensate buyers who purchased at the early spike, changes in liquidity and volume, and comment from the market maker, Coinbase, or regulators.
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