Uniswap Founder Burns 99% Of HayCoin Supply, Calls $650 Billion Valuation “Absurd”

Updated: 23 October 2023

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Uniswap founder Hayden Adams burned 99% of the HayCoin (HAY) supply, saying its valuation was absurd and that he was surprised to see people treat the token like a meme coin.

Adams launched HayCoin five years ago before Uniswap V1’s release. He used a tiny fraction of the token’s supply to create a small test liquidity pool. The remainder, more than 99.9% of the supply, remained in his wallet.

Five years ago, before the launch of Uniswap v1, I deployed a token called HayCoin to use for testing. This was back when gas was so cheap that mainnet could be used as as a testnet. After the launch of v1, I created a small test liquidity pool with a tiny fraction of the total…

— hayden.eth 🦄 (@haydenzadams) October 20, 2023

Adams said he was “extremely surprised” to see people trading high volumes of the token in recent weeks and treating it like a meme coin. He expressed discomfort owning nearly the entire supply of HayCoin and would therefore burn the entire amount in his wallet, “valued at an absurd $650 billion,” he said.

To be extremely clear, I will have no future involvement, have burned all the HAY in my wallet, and think speculating on it silly,” Adams said. “Also prefer a new logo that is not my PFP – ultimately, if my photo is used in this way, I may consider image takedowns.

HayCoin is trading in a six-figure range, according to CoinGecko. It pumped to a new all-time high on October 22 but is down around 24% in the past 24 hours. Token burns tend to have an inflationary effect on the price by reducing the supply significantly.

Crypto Twitter Reacts

Crypto Twitter has reacted to the HayCoin token burn. Some users accused Adams of selling a portion of the tokens and making a six-figure amount before selling the rest. Adams refuted the claims, saying he did not sell any before the burn.

To be clear since since I see people posting misinformation, I did not sell any before burning https://t.co/CtybFCCBp9

— hayden.eth 🦄 (@haydenzadams) October 20, 2023

Another user has also opined that the token burn could be subject to taxation. “Assuming a cost basis of $0, a ~$650 billion disposal gives rise to ~$128 billion long-term capital gains liability,” said Jack Miller, a partner at Cosimo Capital, a digital asset investment firm based in Chicago.

Others said Adams could have sold for a profit and given the gains to charity.