Deep Dive: How Kelsier Ventures Profited $116M from $LIBRA and $MELANIA While Traders Lost Millions

In the ever-turbulent world of cryptocurrencies, one firm’s actions have not only rattled the market but also left thousands of traders reeling from enormous losses.

Kelsier Ventures—a family-run Web3 investment and marketing firm led by CEO Hayden Davis—has come under fire for orchestrating pump-and-dump schemes with memecoins.

In this article, we dive deep into the onchain data to reveal how the firm exploited two notorious tokens—$LIBRA and $MELANIA—to pocket hundreds of millions in profits while leaving thousands of traders with devastating losses.

The Anatomy of the $LIBRA Scandal

The Spark: A Viral Promotion

On February 14, 2025, Argentine President Javier Milei ignited the market frenzy by promoting $LIBRA, a Solana-based memecoin, on X. This high-profile endorsement caused $LIBRA’s market capitalization to soar to an eye-popping $4.5 billion within a short time span. However, the rapid ascent was soon followed by a dramatic collapse—over 90% of its value evaporated in mere hours.

The Human Toll: Massive Trader Losses

The fallout from $LIBRA wasn’t just a statistic—it directly impacted thousands of traders:

• 74,000 traders collectively experienced losses exceeding $286 million.

• Among these, 25 traders saw individual losses surpass $1 million, and 52 traders each lost over $500,000.

The Mechanics: Pump-and-Dump in Action

The data reveals a chillingly precise method behind the $LIBRA disaster:

• Early Activity: In the initial minutes after the liquidity pools were launched on the Meteora platform, a wallet associated with Kelsier Ventures swapped $500,000 in USDC for 1.5 million LIBRA.

• Rapid Dump: Approximately 20 minutes later, this wallet began selling these tokens, resulting in a swift dump that generated a net profit of $3.1 million.

The Hidden Play: Draining Liquidity

Beyond the initial pump and dump, the true financial coup lay in liquidity extraction:

• Liquidity Withdrawal: According to Flipside data, Kelsier Ventures withdrew over $85 million (a combination of USDC and SOL) from LIBRA’s liquidity pools in the first two hours following its launch.

• Market Impact: This massive liquidity drain not only enriched the perpetrators but also directly triggered the catastrophic 90% price collapse, leaving the remaining market participants in chaos.

The $MELANIA Manipulation: Sniping and Liquidity Drains

January 2025 saw another high-stakes experiment by Kelsier Ventures with $MELANIA, a memecoin tied to Melania Trump. Once again, blockchain data unveils a deliberate strategy to manipulate the market:

• Hayden Davis openly admitted to “sniping” early buys—a tactic aimed at securing an advantageous position as soon as the token launched.

A case in point involves the wallet P5tb4T6SBVQaM3BAoGfpVudLtTdecqjsh4KV9ESAhKg (Kelsier Ventures):

• This wallet executed the first swap by purchasing $40,000 USDC worth of $MELANIA.

• Within a few hours, after the token’s price had surged, it sold off the holdings—dumping the token and reaping a profit of $2.6 million.

Yet, the manipulation didn’t stop at early buying and dumping. On January 19, another wallet—7Wk1Vrtp2axUu1g3EX2vLBXbvRXTEgYyRnSkHN1xdMkA—set the stage for an even larger liquidity play:

• The wallet initially acquired 1% of $MELANIA’s supply from the melania-liquidity1.sol.

• It then proceeded to create multiple liquidity pools on Meteora and, after a series of transactions, withdrew liquidity along with accrued fees amounting to $26 million.

• This massive liquidity drain led to a precipitous drop in the token’s price roughly two hours later.

After Kelsier sent 1% of MELANIA’s supply to this address, as mentioned in our previous article, Hayden asked Vlad to sell that entire 1% anonymously. However, Vlad refused and returned the remaining amount. Had they followed through, the resulting catastrophe would have been much worse!

Kelsier’s Playbook: A Two-Step Profit Strategy

The data suggests a systematic approach:

1. Initial Pump and Dump: Kelsier Ventures kicks off by executing rapid trades during the token’s early hours, using their wallets to drive up the price and then dumping their positions for immediate gains.

2. Liquidity Withdrawal: Shortly after, as market hype intensifies and prices surge further, the firm withdraws substantial liquidity from their pools, creating a cascading effect that ultimately crashes the token’s value.

Based on the currently identified onchain addresses linked to Kelsier Ventures, the firm is estimated to have earned over $116 million in profits from its strategies involving MELANIA and LIBRA. Meanwhile, the collateral damage has been significant—not only in terms of the millions lost by individual traders but also in the broader erosion of trust in the crypto market.

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