Research says Pump Fun paid nearly $700K in callout rewards tied mostly to micro-cap tokens

A Protos report, citing research by crypto analyst Dethective, says Pump Fun distributed nearly $700,000 in callout rewards to its top 50 earners, with most of the rewarded token picks tied to very small market capitalizations. According to the analysis, 80% of those accounts shared tokens with an average market cap below $100,000, and 12 callers averaged less than $10,000. Only two callers posted an average median market cap above $1 million, while eight fell between $100,000 and $1 million. The data has fueled criticism that the platform rewarded volume and posting frequency more than the quality of token calls. Protos also noted that Martin Shkreli joined Pump Fun this week and made almost $11,000 from callout rewards, even as memecoins closely tied to him fell 94% in 24 hours. Pump Fun COO Alon Cohen said the company has already reduced the weighting of callout count in its reward formula. The report added that Pump Fun’s token has risen 133% over the past month, though it remains down 46% from its all-time high last September.