New Tornado Cash Wallets Spend $4.28M on PEPE, Accumulating 600M Tokens in 8 Hours

This raises speculation about potential coordinated manipulation or an attempt to profit from a meme coin surge.

Rumors of a hacker buying PEPE have surfaced following a report by blockchain analytics firm Lookonchain.

According to the firm, five wallets spent $4.28 million to buy 611 billion PEPE tokens in the past eight hours. Notably, all five wallets had withdrawn ETH from Tornado Cash, a mixer linked to hackers, 15 days earlier.

This has led to speculation that the five wallets could belong to a hacker who is trying to profit from the meme coin’s surge.

Each of the involved wallets had taken the same confusing (but common) pattern: they first took the funds from Tornado Cash, then swapped them to either USDT or ETH, and then used them to buy PEPE on decentralized exchanges like CoW Swap.

Lookonchain showed several sizable transactions in the order of $250,000 or above carried out in quick succession.

For each wallet, roughly about 99.5 ETH (approximately $181,000 at the time) was taken off Tornado Cash, and the ETH almost matched the collective value (in USDT) spent on PEPE accumulation.

This sequence of actions has created concern within the community, as it’s possible that meme coins might again be used for money laundering as we approach the altcoins’ surge.

PEPE has been drawing controversy, yet it continues to be one of the leading meme coins in the space. It took inspiration from the internet’s famous frog meme, and after exchange listings and post-election hype in the US, it soon soared to an all-time high of $0.000028 in early December.

PEPE coin, however, has cooled off tremendously since then. It’s been brought back 75% from its peak, though there’s been a 13% rally over the past week.

Analyst BOBO identified a ‘double bottom’ pattern on the PEPE chart, signaling a potential rally if it breaks the $0.000009 resistance.

Another analyst, Bitcoinsensus, predicts a bullish wave in August 2025, possibly driving the token to $0.00009, a 1,100% increase from current levels.

It remains to be seen whether this recent buying spree is done by hackers, whales, or institutional opportunists. But one thing is certainly true, and that is PEPE coin is coming back to the spotlight.