Investors who usually play it safe might laugh off volatile meme coins, but when these take off, they challenge even the most cautious minds—until, of course, they plummet. Yet recently, Solana’s meme coin BONK has been defying gravity, soaring to new peaks as SOL itself rebounds after a rough patch. Those who received a stack of free BONK in an airdrop last year might be reaping the rewards now.
According to CoinGecko, BONK has surged by 821% in the last month, consistently hitting record highs and surging past a $1 billion market cap. Individually, each token may not hold much value at $0.00002006, but with millions or billions stashed away, the total becomes substantial.
This windfall might be familiar to some Solana developers—provided they held onto their tokens.
Around Christmas last year, Solana developers who engaged with the LamportDAO community form received a holiday surprise in their wallets: 25 billion BONK tokens, initially valued at around $300, which doubled in value by the day’s end.
Solana’s top meme coin emerged when the ecosystem was struggling, coinciding with SOL plummeting to $8 from a November 2021 high of almost $260. Although the entire crypto market was down, Solana’s association with the collapsed FTX exchange seemed to hit particularly hard.
However, the dog-themed meme coin injected positivity back into the Solana community, benefiting various participants—from Solana DeFi traders to NFT collectors and artists minting on the chain. The airdropped BONK spread far and wide, with LamportDAO devs receiving about 5% of the total token supply.
Following the airdrop, developers expressed gratitude, with some mentioning that the proceeds helped cover essential expenses after enduring a brutal bear market—something that had arguably hit Solana harder than other major chains.
Now, any developer who held onto those 25 billion BONK is sitting on over $500,000 worth of Solana tokens based on current prices. For those who sold early, witnessing such a surge in value might be surprising, teasing the idea of missing out on substantial wealth. Yet for some Solana devs, this windfall possibly provided a lifeline through a challenging crypto period, enabling them to persist and contribute to the future.
