Crypto Wallets Linked to MrBeast Made $13 Million on Tokens Shilled by Influencers

Crypto wallets linked to YouTube personality MrBeast made some $13 million by cashing in on a slew of token launches that were framed by analysts as pump-and-dumps, new on-chain analysis suggests.

The main wallet, which blockchain analytics firm Arkham Intelligence has linked to MrBeast, aka Jimmy Donaldson, and which the content creator himself has previously said he has used to buy NFTs, bought into the token sales of several controversial crypto projects—and shortly thereafter dumped the holdings for massive profits.

An investigation by pseudonymous on-chain analyst SomaXBT concluded that MrBeast-linked wallets made nearly $13 million on dumping a handful of tokens that were collectively bought—mostly over the course of 2021—for potentially as little as $250,000.

In one such case, the wallet appears to have invested $25,000 in the Ethereum meme coin Polkamon (PMON), in exchange for 25,000 PMON. Hours later, the MrBeast-affiliated address dumped the tokens for a profit of nearly $1.3 million.

8/ – on 2021-03-23 Me.beast wallet sent $25k USDT
– 2021-03-31 18:07 received 25k $PMON token from the private distribution contract
– 2021-04-01 00:27 again sent 25k $PMON tokens to the ‘0x4f7b6’ wallet
– in next 12 hours, ‘0x4f7b6’ wallet dumped 25k $PMON in 485 trades and made… pic.twitter.com/2pEjpYmH7H

— SomaXBT (@somaxbt) October 11, 2024

As elaborated upon in detail by the pseudonymous on-chain sleuth ZachXBT at the time, Polkamon faced allegations of bring designed to enrich investors and insiders by dumping on retail traders who were left holding bags with little to no value. In the summer of 2021, ZachXBT described Polkamon as a crypto project that “exemplified suspicious activity.”

4/ Polkamon ($PMON)

As one of the largest marketing failures this bull run the chart exemplified suspicious activity.

In doing so I reviewed the entire transaction history from launch to June. Below is a brief summary of my findings. pic.twitter.com/cOKmSAlwjv

— ZachXBT (@zachxbt) June 30, 2021

Other projects that the MrBeast-linked wallet similarly profited from include SuperVerse (SUPER), which MrBeast publicly supported in 2021 with numerous posts on Twitter. The wallet associated with the YouTube personality appears to have received one million SUPER tokens in exchange for $100,000 USDC; a month later, the wallet dumped the tokens at its all-time high peak price. Over the following weeks, SUPER crashed in value by over 90%.

All told, the MrBeast-linked wallet made over $9 million on its SUPER trades.

6/ All sudden,
– on 2021-03-30, Mr beast transferred those 1 million $SUPER tokens to the new wallet ‘0x4f7b6.’ with 0.2 ETH (for gas fees)
– in next 24 hours, ‘0x4f7b6’ wallet dumped all 1 million $SUPER tokens in 751 trades and made 1900 ETH
– Next day, on 2021-03-31 21:05,… pic.twitter.com/fKZTvmDVEt

— SomaXBT (@somaxbt) October 11, 2024

While these controversial moves are directly linked to a crypto wallet that MrBeast has publicly admitted to using, it is not necessarily certain that MrBeast himself made the trades in question.

Conor Grogan, head of product at Coinbase, has previously scrutinized transactions made by the MrBeast-linked wallet in question. But even he exercised caution about what conclusions to draw from such on-chain behavior.

“There is always a chance that a friend or producer or someone completely unrelated were behind those accounts,” Grogan told Decrypt. “It’s too hard to tell. So I generally don’t like accusing people without firm evidence.”

Decrypt reached out to MrBeast and his team regarding the transactions, but did not immediately receive a response.

Edited by Andrew Hayward