Pump.fun Establishes Pump Fund: Launches a $3 million hackathon, ecological expansion enters a new phase

Pump.fun officially establishes its investment division, Pump Fund, and simultaneously launches the “Build in Public” hackathon with a total prize pool of up to 3 million USD. According to its plan, this hackathon will invest 2.5 million USD in each of the 12 final selected projects, based on a valuation of 10 million USD.

This Solana-based memecoin launch platform aims to promote the development of early-stage projects within its ecosystem through direct capital and resource injection, marking a strategic expansion of its business footprint from a tool platform to investment incubation.

01 Strategic Upgrade

Pump.fun announces the creation of a new investment division, Pump Fund, marking the beginning of this meme coin launch platform’s systematic construction of its own ecosystem.

The first major initiative of this fund is to launch a hackathon called “Build in Public,” with a total prize pool of up to 3 million USD.

Unlike traditional venture capital or judge-based scoring systems, Pump.fun emphasizes that the market itself will serve as the core evaluation mechanism for projects. Participating projects are required to issue tokens early on and demonstrate their value by attracting genuine user attention and market investment.

02 Ecosystem Incubation

This hackathon is designed as a public market competition. To qualify, projects must first issue their own tokens on the Pump.fun platform and commit to holding at least 10% of the token supply.

Evaluation criteria will prioritize the project’s organic growth potential and long-term viability over short-term price speculation.

The event is open not only to native crypto projects but also to projects outside the crypto space. According to the announcement, the registration deadline for the hackathon is February 18, and the list of the first batch of winners will be announced within 30 days after registration closes.

03 Market Background

Pump.fun’s expansion is driven by deep market factors. In early 2026, Pump.fun announced a major reform of its creator fee model, aiming to incentivize high-quality projects and innovation through a more market-driven dynamic fee structure.

This reform caused its native token PUMP to experience an intraday increase of over 10%.

Additionally, the platform’s active token buyback policy has injected confidence into the market. Data shows that since the buyback program was launched in July 2025, Pump.fun has repurchased approximately 250 million USD worth of PUMP tokens, reducing its total circulating supply by about 19.449%.

04 Token Performance

According to the latest data from Gate.io on January 20, PUMP’s price has shown a rebound trend.

Its price increased by 3.00% in the past 24 hours, with a 7.72% gain over the past 7 days, and a 33.95% increase over the past 30 days.

Currently, PUMP has a circulating supply of approximately 590 billion tokens, with a total and max supply of 1 trillion tokens. Despite challenges, ongoing token buybacks and continuous ecosystem development provide fundamental support for the token’s long-term value.

05 Challenges and Future Outlook

Despite frequent actions, Pump.fun’s future remains full of challenges. An industry analysis report pointed out that the platform’s progress in attracting mainstream non-crypto creators and building a sustainable creator economy model has not met expectations.

The report specifically mentions that, apart from the early viral “Bagwork” project, most creator token models are difficult to sustain.

Furthermore, the platform faces regulatory pressures, including a lawsuit involving 500 million USD, which is expected to reach a critical ruling on January 23, 2026, potentially having a profound impact on the platform. Additionally, a large-scale token unlock involving approximately 41% of the total supply scheduled for July 2026 is a potential market risk point.

Nevertheless, Pump.fun demonstrates its determination to build a deeper and broader moat by establishing Pump Fund. From a simple launch tool to an incubator, and exploring multi-chain and broader application scenarios, Pump.fun’s transformation journey has already begun.

The launch of the investment division and hackathon signifies that this memecoin launcher leader is attempting to upgrade from a mere “coin factory” to a self-driven innovation ecosystem.

This is not only about distributing 3 million USD in funds but also about whether it can create a systemic environment for the emergence of the next “Bagwork,” thereby finding sustainable vitality in fierce platform competition through the bull and bear markets.