Ansem Says Trust, Not Buybacks, Explains 46-Fold Valuation Gap Between HYPE and PUMP

Ansem, a crypto trader with a large social-media following, said token buybacks alone are not enough to support a project's valuation over the long term.

Crypto-focused media outlet Wu Blockchain reported on X on July 17 that Ansem said buybacks cannot rescue a weak valuation.

Ansem built his influence in the industry by predicting moves in Solana and the memecoin market. Traders often treat his posts and reactions as price signals, and a memecoin bearing his name, ANSEM, was also launched.

He pointed to the valuation gap between Hyperliquid and Pump.fun as an example. The two platforms generate annualized revenue of about $800 million and $440 million, respectively. Both also use part of their revenue to repurchase tokens.

Their fully diluted valuations are vastly different. Hyperliquid's HYPE has an FDV of about $65 billion, while Pump.fun's PUMP stands at about $1.4 billion.

Ansem said the gap comes down less to buybacks than to user trust and community reward structures. Hyperliquid has consistently rewarded core users, while Pump.fun's "trust premium" has weakened because of an unfulfilled airdrop promise.

The point, he suggested, is that buybacks alone do little to narrow a valuation gap if a project fails to build trust with users and investors.