Pump.fun staff lost millions after layoffs, report claims

Solana memecoin platform Pump.fun reportedly terminated over 40 employees shortly before their token allocations vested. The cuts stripped staff of $PUMP tokens, leaving at least one former employee without a seven-figure payout.

The launchpad fired staff in late March and early April. According to a Sandmark report, the firm obtained internal documents, emails, and audio and video recordings of a meeting. Noah Tweedale, one of the company’s co-founders, explained to employees that the cuts were necessary because the firm “had grown too quickly,” preventing Pump.fun from being “fast and rough.”

Pump.fun stayed silent on the allegations

A “termination of services” email, seen by Sandmark, instructed Pump.fun employees to attend the meeting with Lloyd McCarthy, the firm’s head of talent. Employees who lost their jobs had their agreements terminated in early April, and they were compensated with one week of severance pay for each month of service.

Tweedale and his co-founder, Alon Cohen, did not respond to Sandmark’s inquiries. Pump.fun has not issued any response to the allegations.

The employees were terminated due to a two-year delay in the release of their tokens. Pump.fun employees signed token grant agreements in mid-June 2025, and a quarter of their PUMP allocations were set to unlock in June 2026, according to the report. Therefore, those who left the company before that date lost their tokens.

For one employee, this meant giving up on a seven-figure sum. Sandmark noted that, at the time of the report, the value of the allocation was over $1 million at current prices.

The figure holds even though PUMP has fallen sharply. Sandmark, citing TradingView, put the token about 79% below its 2025 peak of $0.0089. Meanwhile, the Crypto Times journal noted a slightly lower drop of 69% from the peak. The token is down 26% per year and changed hands for about $0.002 as the reports circulated, climbing by almost 8% on the day.

Inside Pump.fun’s reported second layoff wave

The ex-employees of Pump.fun noted that there may have been a second round of layoffs, which occurred in mid-July, according to Sandmark. An X account, ExPumpEmployee, began posting “termination of services” emails on Thursday, claiming to have been fired one day before their PUMP tokens would have vested.

Over 40 employees were laid off in two waves, according to both Pump.fun ex-employees, with Sandmark noting that it could not verify the figure or every detail provided. KuCoin’s news desk, to which the report was shared for comment, also indicated that over 40 employees were laid off in two months.

The number is notable given the explosive rise of Pump.fun and its current status as one of crypto’s highest-revenue-generating platforms. The memecoin launchpad saw its user base grow from three to nearly 100 employees this year, as per Sandmark, after attracting users to create over 20.8 million tokens on the platform. It has generated “roughly $1.3 billion in lifetime revenue and still takes in about $1 million per day,” according to the report, which cites analytics from Dune.

A UK-based company with regulatory issues

Pump.fun is incorporated in the UK under the name Baton Corporation Ltd. It has blocked UK users since December 2024, after the Financial Conduct Authority warned it that it may be “carrying on activities which require authorization.” It is currently on the FCA’s warning list.

The UK’s connection to Pump.fun was first established in 2024, when former employee Jarett Dunn transferred around $2 million from one of the company’s wallets to thousands of addresses, claiming to have “killed” the memecoin. Wood Green Crown Court sentenced Dunn to six years in prison in December 2025. Earlier, Cryptopolitan reported that Pump.fun launches bounty feature, and users were posting suicide offers.

Sandmark noted that Baton’s accounts for the period through September 30, 2025, were due by June 30 and were now delinquent, with a potential fine of up to £375. Pump.fun has had several UK-based legal issues, including a lawsuit claiming that it operated a “rigged” offering for investors and another regarding its maximal extractable value practices. 

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