Pippin Whale Wallets Trigger 50% Crash: Zero Warning Signs Flagged Before Solana AI Memecoin Plunge

A coordinated sell-off by over 50 whale wallets has sent the Solana-based AI memecoin PIPPIN crashing nearly 60% in 24 hours, wiping out approximately $200 million in market capitalization. The token plummeted from around $0.35 to below $0.15 on March 17, 2025, following a week of stealth accumulation by the same accounts, with trading volume surging 80% to $80 million as the token exited the top 200 crypto assets.

Bottom falls out after PIPPIN accumulation 

As catastrophic as the crash was, some had seen it coming. On-chain analysts at how2onchain flagged the accumulation pattern days before the crash, pointing out active buying across multiple clustered wallets with fresh addresses joining the range in real time. 

The biggest wallets were averaging around $100k in purchases per day (for each wallet), with six addresses specifically named as the primary movers (beginning with HjizUqP, E1oQG6g, 8M2CBM, FXj7ZPV, 4Dk8hCg and CTcFhZy) and all accumulating in a coordinated pattern. 

$PIPPIN ACCUMULATION CONTINUES

What’s happening with $PIPPIN right now?
There are active buys across multiple clustered wallets, along with fresh wallets accumulating during the current range

Top wallets are buying around $100K worth of tokens per wallet daily on average at the… pic.twitter.com/fL3r5TeRML

— onchainschool.pro (@how2onchain) March 12, 2026

By the time the market opened today, those same wallets were containing tokens worth $500k-$900k each. 

Over 50 wallets were involved in the sale, and all of them were traced using Nansen’s Token God Mode. The structure was clean, deliberate, and in retrospect, entirely visible to anyone who knew where to look. The accumulation phase and the distribution phase appeared to be two halves of the same operation.

Cryptopolitan reported last year that BubbleMaps called out a red flag with the $PIPPIN token, as almost half of its supply is controlled by insiders.

Is the ZRO accumulation a red flag?

On the same day as the PIPPIN crash, Nansen spotted an identical accumulation pattern quietly building in LayerZero’s ZRO token.

2/ Every wallet funded by one source: Coinbase Prime.

4 wallets received a 1 $ZRO test transaction before the main transfer.

8 wallets funded within 4 hours on March 9. $35.8M moved in a single afternoon.

All 9 wallets hold only $ZRO. Nothing else.

This isn't retail.… pic.twitter.com/7ztOUwTIc1

— Nansen 🧭 (@nansen_ai) March 17, 2026

According to Nansen’s analytics, nine wallets accumulated $24.5 million ZRO tokens (about 2.6% of the circulating supply) at an average price of $1.94, bringing the total up to $47.5 million. 

None of those wallets has sold any tokens, and every detail of the pattern points toward the fact that all nine wallets were funded by one source, Coinbase Prime.

The data revealed that four wallets received a 1 ZRO test transaction before the main transfer, and eight of the nine wallets were funded within a four-hour window on March 9, with $35.8 million moved in just one afternoon. 

Interestingly, each wallet holds nothing else except ZRO tokens.

Nonetheless, Nansen’s analytics suggests a large-scale institutional positioning ahead of the March 20 token unlock, reflecting conviction despite the obvious supply pressure that the unlock would bring. 

Another interesting fact worth noting is that the accumulation began exactly three weeks after LayerZero’s CEO Bryan Pellegrino announced Zero, the project’s own Layer 1 blockchain designed to hit 2 million transactions per second.

What does this mean?

Beyond the superficial connection, the accumulation of PIPPIN and ZRO appears to be for structurally different reasons. 

The nine Coinbase Prime wallets are a different indicator from the 50+ insider wallet cluster that quietly stacked PIPPIN’s supply. Institutional accumulation tied to a genuine Layer 1 launch also carries a logic that memecoin whale moves do not.

However, the surface-level resemblance is difficult to dismiss entirely, especially as a compelling narrative catalyst

The PIPPIN token hit an all-time high of $0.8964 on February 26, 2026, and has shed more than 82% of that value with today’s crash. The concentrated supply that powered its growth appears to have been instrumental to its crash.

For ZRO, on the other hand, the March 20 unlock now serves as the first real stress test. Whether the nine wallets hold through it, use the unlock-driven liquidity as cover to begin distributing, or signal a longer-term strategic play around the Zero Layer 1 remains an open question.

Your bank is using your money. You’re getting the scraps. Watch our free video on becoming your own bank