Solana Meme Coin Surges 6,000% After Creators Arrested Over 'Rug Pull'
South Korean prosecutors charged five individuals for orchestrating a "rug pull" scam involving the CatFi meme coin, created on Solana’s Pump.fun in February 2025. The defendants promoted and then mass-sold the token, collapsing its market cap from $8.37 million to $12,170 within hours, causing 256 investors to lose a total of roughly $600,000. Two promoters were arrested; three technical contributors were charged but not detained. This is the first case prosecuted under South Korea’s Virtual Asset User Protection Act and the country’s first crypto crime case on a decentralized exchange. The charges were welcomed by the blockchain analysis community as a precedent for legal consequences in such scams. Ironically, following news of the prosecution, traders drove CatFi’s price up nearly 6,000% in a day from $2,350 to $167,000, despite the token still being down 96% from its all-time high. A new group claims they aim to “unrug” the token.
