How Crypto Insiders Are Sidestepping the Law to Dump on Retail - Ep. 895

Unchained

Laura Shin

News, Tech News, Business News

4.6 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 3 September 2025

⏱️ 58 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Behind some of the biggest token launches of the past year — from Trump’s $TRUMP coin to the recent Kanye West’s $YZY, to the collapse of $LIBRA and this week’s launch of $WLFI — the same insider names keep popping up. In this episode, Bubblemaps CEO Nicolas Vaiman explains how figures like Hayden Davis of Kelsier Ventures, celebrity promoter Sahil Arora, Naseem, and even Justin Sun have profited from chaotic launches. We dig into the mechanics of insider “snipes,” one-sided LPs that hide selling, and why celebrity and political tokens so often collapse right after launch. Finally, Nick asks: if “no one is coming to save us,” what real protections can the industry build? Thank you to our sponsors! Mantle Re Guest: Nicolas Vaiman, CEO and co-founder of Bubblemaps Links: Previous coverage of Unchained on these token launches: Why Would Argentine President Javier Milei Protect Kelsier's Hayden Davis? How the Libra Scandal Exposed Memecoin Insider Trading on the World Stage Why Lyn Alden Isn't a Fan of Trump’s Memecoin Unchained: LIBRA Facilitator Sniped $12M of Kanye West’s YZY Token: Bubblemaps YZY Sniper Wallet Traced to LIBRA Scheme Kanye West’s YZY Token Launches With ‘Class Action Waiver’ Trump Family Grows $5 Billion Richer After WLFI Token Sale Circle Freezes $57M of USDC Linked to Libra Scandal Timestamps: ⏱ 0:00 Introduction 🔍 0:56 How Nick verified Trump’s memecoin was legit but Melania’s looked fishy, and how that led to Hayden Davis 🕵️ 8:00 What role Davis played in other shady memecoin launches 🎤 10:51 How Davis was tied to Kanye West’s $YZY token ⚡ 15:48 How sophisticated snipers find tokens onchain before everyone else ❓ 21:28 How Davis recovered frozen funds, and does this mean “crime is legal” in crypto? 👑 27:16 Why do celebrity memecoins almost always collapse 🎯 31:30 How are snipers plaguing the industry 😈 37:14 What tactics has Sahil Arora, the “crypto villain,” been accused of 🛠 40:51 How should the industry respond to these kinds of token launches 📈 46:07 How Justin Sun made a 10x on WLFI 👨‍💻 49:27 What’s Nick’s background and why he created Bubblemaps 🔮 53:32 How Bubblemaps plans to stand out from competitors Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	You have 10 minutes to invest. If you miss this initial 10 minutes, you're going to invest into the peak, and you're just going to be exit liquidity for the snipers who got in it for a second.
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0:52.3	Hey, everyone. I'm here with Nick Weiman, CEO and co-founder of Bubble Maps.
0:53.1	Welcome, Nick.
0:55.4	Thank you for having me, Laura. Pleasure to be on.
1:00.4	Bubble Maps has had some great investigations into recent shenanigans in the cryptos involving people like Hayden Davis, Sahel, Aurora, and others. But let's start with Hayden Davis.
1:07.9	He's a character that's appeared in a number of these incidents. And he was
1:13.8	involved in what you called the presidential coins because there were a few of those. So tell us about
1:19.8	your investigation into those. Absolutely. And it has certainly been an interesting year for
1:25.5	crypto with this presidential coins.
1:27.8	I think nobody expected this tokenization era to go that far.
1:32.3	Because last year we already have all the celebrities launching tokens.
1:37.3	I think you had Igia Zela on your show at some point.
1:40.3	But only a few people were expecting this to go that far that even the president of the United States would endorse and would launch his own Minkoin.
1:49.8	And it was, I remember this vividly, it was at the beginning of the year on a Saturday morning.
1:55.7	I live in Europe and we woke up to this madness of the president, Trump, launching his own link coin.
	...

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