Pump and Pump·Solana lawsuit, weak evidence is the key issue

The latest lawsuit filed by Willick Law Firm on January 14 has sparked significant controversy within the cryptocurrency community. The lawsuit, targeting PumpFund and parties related to Solana, centers around issues of platform fairness, but there are concerns that the evidence presented in the case is weak.

“Manipulated Casino” Claim, but Direct Evidence Is Insufficient

Willick Law Firm alleges that PumpFund disguises itself as a probability game but in reality, the operators “secretly predetermined wins and losses to exploit individual investors for enormous profits.” According to the lawsuit documents, co-founder Alon Cohen acknowledged that most investors suffered losses on the platform.

However, legal experts reviewing the evidence have pointed out that there is little conclusive proof that PumpFund systematically engaged in price manipulation. In particular, there is a lack of evidence demonstrating that the management directly profited financially from these activities.

Low Strength of Claims of Conflicts of Interest by Promoters

The lawsuit claims that anonymous KOLs profited from promoting meme coins but did not disclose these earnings, and that they received prior information about token purchases before the promotion began. Nonetheless, concrete transaction records or communication evidence supporting these claims are weak.

The core criticism of the lawsuit is that the platform failed to implement fair safeguards, such as setting random entry periods to mitigate advantages held by bots and insiders in establishing positions. This is viewed as a design flaw of the platform.

Skepticism About Solana’s Responsibility from External Sources

The lawsuit argues that Solana’s network speed, priority fee system, and the network congestion mitigation update in March 2024 enabled the expansion of meme coin trading volume. However, industry experts generally believe that there is little direct causal link between these network improvements and PumpFund’s misconduct.

Improving network infrastructure alone is unlikely to be considered responsible for the platform’s illegal activities. As a result, there is speculation that many of the allegations against Solana may be dismissed during the legal proceedings.

Ultimately, the outcome of this lawsuit will likely depend on how effectively the plaintiffs can strengthen the currently weak evidence.