Kylian Mbappe Twitter Hack Causes MBAPPE Token Surge—One Trader Nets $200K Profit

• Kylian Mbappe’s X account was hacked, and a fraudulent $MBAPPE token was promoted, leading to significant losses for investors.

• Some users lost millions, while others profited from the scam before the token’s value crashed.

French football star Kylian Mbappe’s X (formerly Twitter) account was hacked on Thursday, leading to the promotion of a fraudulent token named $MBAPPE. The incident, which resulted in millions being lost by unsuspecting investors, highlights a growing trend of celebrity accounts targeted for crypto pump-and-dump schemes.

French football star Kylian Mbappe's Twitter account was hacked and released the token MBAPPE, which has now been deleted. The market value of MBAPPE tokens surged to tens of millions in a few minutes and then quickly returned to zero. A user bought 2 SOL (about $286) and sold it…

— Wu Blockchain (@WuBlockchain) August 29, 2024

Kylian Mbappe of Real Madrid CF has 14.4 million followers on X, and the hacker capitalized on this by posting a contract for the $MBAPPE token on the footballer’s account. Within minutes, the token’s market capitalization was in the tens of millions of dollars, attracting many investors.

The hacker employed the platform pump. fun to initiate and market the $MBAPPE token, thus causing a stir among Mbappe’s fans and crypto traders. However, the plan went awry, and the hacker liquidated the entire meme coin supply, which led to the complete demotion of its value to zero. The post has since been removed, but the harm has already been done. 

Victims of the Rug Pull

The incident has affected many people in one way or another, with some losing a lot of money. As reported by Lookonchain, a user who was not aware of the scam opened a new wallet and put in 7,156 Solana, which is equivalent to $1,032,741 in $MBAPPE tokens. By the end of the first hour, their investment had lost almost all of its value, and they were left with a portfolio of only $9,200. 

Someone created a new wallet and spent 7,156 $SOL($1.03M) to buy a #MEMEcoin named $MBAPPE in a single transaction, which is now only worth $9.2K.

This person lost more than $1M in just 1 hour!https://t.co/IKsUN14km1 pic.twitter.com/kTF6SQCKT4

— Lookonchain (@lookonchain) August 29, 2024

However, some investors were able to gain from the scam. According to the journalist Colin Wu, one user bought $2 of SOL and sold $MBAPPE at its top price, earning about 1,398 SOL or $200,000. 

Another trader profited from the situation. This trader bought the $MBAPPE token with 0.2 Solana, which is equal to $29, and then sold it in just 3 minutes with 866.14 Solana, which is equal to $125,160, getting a 4,330x profit. This trader is one of the few who was able to benefit from this particular scam, while the rest of the investors lost their money.

Celebrity-Targeted Crypto Scams Gain Traction and Cause Widespread Damage

The hacking of Mbappe’s X account is a part of the larger trend where cybercriminals are using celebrities to push fake cryptocurrency projects. Earlier this month, the official McDonald’s Instagram account was also hacked, and the hacker posted about the meme coin Grimace (GRIMACE30045-USD). The scam led to the coin’s market capitalization hitting $20 million before plummeting to sub-$1 million as the fraudsters withdrew their funds. 

The McDonald’s hacker even changed the company’s Instagram bio, claiming to have stolen $700k and encouraging people to invest through Pump. fun with a guarantee of high profit. This was further made possible by hijacking the X account of McDonald’s senior marketing director to promote the fake token. 

This is not the first time Mbappé’s Twitter account has been hacked just to solicit money from unsuspecting individuals. In 2019 and 2020, hackers hijacked his account to push Bitcoin scams, tempting investors with instant profits.