As reports started to circulate early Tuesday that Minnesota Governor Tim Walz had been chosen as Kamala Harris’ running mate, the prices of Walz-related meme coins soared. But the gains wouldn’t last for long.
The week-old “Tem Walz” (WALZ), an intentionally misspelled Solana meme coin continuing the trend of other similar political meme coins, was the biggest winner of the day, peaking at a market cap of nearly $1 million. But it has fallen sharply since to a current market cap of just $254,000.
Similarly, an Ethereum meme coin simply called Tim Walz (also WALZ) saw a 208% pump as the news came in, peaking at a market cap of $707,000. But it has similarly plummeted to a market cap of $303,000 as traders cashed out on the short-lived hype and caused momentum to crash.
Walz was officially announced Tuesday as the vice presidential pick of likely Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris, the current U.S. Vice President under Joe Biden. But speculation around the selection started earlier in the day, impacting not only meme coin prices but also the betting pool on leading crypto prediction markets platform Polymarket.
Images of black SUVs leaving Walz’s house began to circulate on Twitter, which caused the Solana WALZ token to soar 173% in just 18 minutes. While the SUVs raised suspicions, there hadn’t been any official reports at that time that Harris had chosen Walz, and the price dipped soon after the spike.
But at 8:48am ET, CNN reported that it had learned that Harris had picked Walz as her running mate over other contenders like Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, causing the token to pump a further 31% to a market cap of $990,000. And not only did the WALZ token jump, but the creator says he’s also a fan of the VP selection.
“I’m so happy that Walz was picked. Shapiro doesn’t seem genuine,” the pseudonymous creator of Tem Walz, Cryptocy, told Decrypt. “I will definitely vote for Kamala Harris now. If she picked Shapiro, I would have not voted at all.”
On the flip side, however, tokens inspired by potential other VP picks crashed hard after the Walz news started spreading. “Josh Shapero” (SHAPERO), an intentionally misspelled Josh Shapiro meme coin on Solana, dropped 94% in just half an hour as the news broke. Previously at a market cap of $726,000, it now sits at just $11,000.
As the price of SHAPERO dropped, the pseudonymous creator AM alleged in the coin’s Telegram channel that it was just “intentional FUD being spread”—aka “fear, uncertainty, and doubt” orchestrated to push down the price.
Four minutes later, CNN reported that Walz would indeed be Harris’ running mate.
“Oh my fuckin’ god, who rugged my bag?” one SHAPERO investor responded in the chat.
Edited by Andrew Hayward
