Blockchain investigator Zachary Wolk, known online as ZachXBT, publicly accused crypto influencer Zion “Ansem” Thomas of promoting a series of low market cap memecoins to his large following.
Crypto influencer Zion “Ansem” Thomas is facing accusations from blockchain investigator Zachary Wolk, also known as ZachXBT, of promoting a string of low market cap memecoins to his large following. In an Oct. 5 exchange on X, Wolk took aim at Thomas’ approach, which he described as a “pump and dump” tactic. Specifically, Wolk claims that Thomas is using his influence to artificially inflate coin prices, potentially leading to substantial losses for his followers.
Highlighting the sensitivity of smaller coins to market movements driven by prominent figures, Wolk’s矛头直指Thomas' promotion of Solana-based memecoins. According to the investigator, Thomas is exploiting his large following of over 507,000 users to manipulate prices.
“If you resort to promoting new low cap memecoins every few days to followers as a large account, it’s [because] you have no edge and have to use your followers instead.”
Accusations Stem from Ansem’s Promotion of Memecoins
Wolk pointed to several tokens that Thomas had allegedly promoted, including BODEN, HOBBES, ZEUS, and WYNN, all of which have seen their values plummet. This stands in contrast to other coins, like Chainlink (LINK), which is down 90% against Bitcoin year-to-date, highlighting the risks associated with such low-cap coins.
In response, Thomas questioned why promoting “lowcaps” was labeled as “grifting” and defended his support for these coins. He highlighted Dogwifhat (WIF) as an example, which had a market cap of $100,000 at the time of his promotion and later surged to $4.8 billion in March.
“The ‘low cap garbage’ you talk about has dominated 90% of retail mindshare in crypto over the past year.”
BODEN, HOBBES, ZEUS, WYNN Memecoins See Massive Declines
Many of the coins that ZachXBT mentioned have seen sharp declines in value. For instance, BODEN, a memecoin themed around President Joe Biden, is down almost 99% from its all-time high of $1.04 billion in April, data from CoinGecko shows. Similarly, HOBBES, ZEUS, and WYNN have all dropped by approximately 98% from their peaks.