Solana co-founder Anatoly Yakovenko has sparked controversy after referring to memecoins and non-fungible tokens as “digital slop,” regardless of Solana’s substantial memecoin-driven income.
“I’ve stated this for years. Memecoins and NFTs are digital slop and don’t have any intrinsic worth,” Yakovenko said in a X put up on Sunday whereas evaluating the crypto tokens to loot bins in free-to-play cell video games.
Yakovenko’s remark got here throughout a debate with Base creator Jesse Pollak over whether or not memecoins and NFTs have basic worth, and if that’s the case, the place that worth lies.
The Solana Labs CEO argued that their worth is derived via market-driven worth discovery, whereas Pollak countered that there’s intrinsic worth within the content material itself.
“The content material itself is effective. identical to a portray is basically priceless, no matter whether or not you cost folks on the museum to see it.”
Solana memecoins are like Apple’s loot bins
Yakovenko acknowledged that with out memecoins, Solana wouldn’t be the place it’s as we speak, however claimed that Apple’s revenues would even be negligible if it weren’t for loot bins.
Loot bins are in-app digital rewards discovered in lots of free-to-play video games within the Apple App Retailer. Critics argue they exploit gamers by encouraging repeated spending with out assured outcomes. The shortage of transparency across the loot bins has resulted in regulatory scrutiny in a number of international locations, together with Australia and Germany.
Earlier X posts from Yakovenko present that he has held the view that memecoins and NFTs don’t have any worth since at the least January 2024.
Yakovenko hit with criticism
Yakovenko’s newest feedback acquired renewed criticism from members of the crypto neighborhood, together with Flaunch contributor and X consumer “Caps,” who called out the Solana boss for mocking his user base.
Crypto commentator and X consumer Karbon added: “I’m not an enormous fan of how Vitalik dealt with memecoins […] however I discover Toly’s strategy far more distasteful, actively selling them always whereas believing they’re nugatory.”
Solana continues to be ultra-reliant on memecoin exercise
According to Solana-focused infrastructure agency Syndica, memecoins accounted for 62% of the Solana community’s decentralized app income in June, a brand new all-time excessive.
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Memecoin exercise has pushed the vast majority of Solana’s $1.6 billion in revenue throughout the first half of 2025.
A big share of memecoin income has come from Solana-based memecoin launchpad Pump.fun and PumpSwap, which features as a decentralized alternate aggregator for Pump.fun-launched memecoins.
Nevertheless, rival platform LetBonk has just lately emerged as a severe competitor to Pump.enjoyable, at occasions surpassing it in 24-hour income as Solana’s high memecoin launchpad.
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