Can Pump.fun tell new stories next year?

Original Title: Pump's Year Ahead: Reflections on Resilience, Creator Economics, and the Search for Direction

Original Author: @simononchain, Crypto KOL

Original Compilation: Deep Tide TechFlow

The following content is excerpted from Delphi's upcoming "2026 Application Outlook Report," focusing on Pump(.)fun------one of the consumer applications we are most interested in for the coming year.

Since we released the initial Pump report (before its funding), many things have changed. Many of the dynamics we predicted have been validated, but there are also areas that have not met expectations, disappointing users and investors. However, the core challenges facing Pump remain unchanged.

To achieve Pump's grand vision, the team needs to find a balance between the short-term profit-seeking nature of the crypto industry and its long-term vision for the platform. Notably, once a project launches its token, the operating environment changes; the token itself becomes an independent product with inherent reflexivity, continuously influencing user expectations, and Pump is no exception.

Since completing its funding, the Pump team has been increasing its investment in crypto-native streaming, but the development in this area has not gone as smoothly as we expected, at least not to the ideal state yet.

Pump has not successfully attracted core creators from outside the crypto ecosystem, and the CCM meta universe that has emerged on the Pump platform has also been fleeting. The most notable moments came from the "Bagwork" event, which not only showcased the potential of creator-driven tokens but also revealed structural issues hindering the development of this model.

This phenomenal outbreak was led by a group of teenagers who, with some support from Pump, completed a series of controversial events: stealing Bradley Martyn's hat, storming onto the Dodgers' field, rushing onto the Knicks' court, and even getting tattoos of Pumpfun and Bagwork.

The rise of @onlybagwork almost perfectly coincided with the peak of Pump.fun's excitement in mid-September. At that time, the fully diluted valuation (FDV) of $PUMP reached about $8.5 billion, while Bagwork's market cap briefly surpassed $50 million.

However, since then, no other creator token has come close to this organic momentum or reached a similar valuation peak.

The Knicks' court incident occurred more recently, long after the initial excitement had passed, and now Bagwork's market cap is just slightly above $2 million.

Bagwork is one of the few cases in Pump's streaming experiment that has truly operated as expected. The Bagwork team earned over 2,300 SOL in creator revenue through $BAGWORK transaction fees (approximately $300,000 at current prices).

Notably, all of this was achieved without the team selling their holdings. The viral events directly translated into attention, trading volume, and fee income, creating the closest case to a true creator token flywheel effect that Pump has seen so far.

However, aside from Bagwork, Pump still struggles to realize its streaming vision. Creator tokens have consistently failed to maintain their value. This phenomenon can be traced back to a fundamental issue: the token itself is part of the product.

Currently, the economic rationale for owning or supporting a streamer token remains unclear. Bagwork's early success quickly faded, and since then, every major streamer token has failed to garner similar attention, ultimately trending toward zero.

Creators can gain short-term benefits through the fee structure of CCM, but the reputational risks associated with collapsing tokens make this model unattractive to bigger, more established creators, who could help the platform attract a broader audience. From a trader's perspective, these tokens remain a zero-sum game environment rather than a true community.

This is the most important issue that Pump needs to address as it moves into 2026.

Currently, the team has not made meaningful attempts at deeper creator incentive mechanisms, and airdrop allocations have yet to be addressed. Aside from the informal support provided during the Bagwork craze, Pump has not taken any coordinated measures, such as targeted airdrops, creator rewards, or other incentive mechanisms, which could have been used to kickstart early activities, create more PvE (player versus environment) incentives, and provide creators with a testing space without immediately disrupting their community ecology.

The good news is that this provides Pump with significant flexibility.

The unused "Community & Ecosystem Initiatives" fund pool remains an important lever that the team can leverage when the model matures. If Pump can design a sustainable creator token incentive structure, it will open a new economic category for creators looking to monetize and expand their audience through crypto mechanisms.

Despite the substantial potential rewards, streaming will continue to manifest as a series of fleeting hype cycles rather than a lasting and repeatable vertical.

In terms of tokens, the main catalyst driving $PUMP from about $0.025 to $0.085 was the team's decision to use 100% of net revenue for buybacks.

Pump shifted from initially planning to allocate about a quarter of its revenue for buybacks to almost entirely adopting a Hyperliquid-style buyback model. This change was made after the market clearly indicated that some buyback models would not be recognized. This shift ignited one of the strongest rebounds of large-cap tokens in this year's liquidity-scarce and challenging altcoin market.

In terms of buyback-to-market cap ratio, currently, no major token has a lower trading multiple.

Based on current data, Pump's annualized revenue is $422 million, with a market cap of $1.84 billion, resulting in a market cap/revenue ratio (MC/Rev) of 4.36 times and an annualized buyback yield of about 12.8%. This level is significantly lower than other large-cap tokens, including Hyperliquid's approximately 8.01 times MC/Rev and about 3.34% yield.

Even so, the market remains skeptical about Pump's long-term business prospects.

Market concerns may include: whether the team can continue to launch meaningful products; the future impact of token unlocks with about 40% of the token supply yet to be unlocked; and the uncertainty surrounding the final distribution of airdrops and creator incentive allocations. Additionally, the overall contraction of meme coin activity in the crypto market, reduced terminal activity, and questions about the sustainability of Pump's revenue base also raise doubts.

Despite these concerns, Pump still dominates the meme coin issuance platform space, earning (and buying back) about $1 million daily even in the current extremely challenging market environment.

Pump's daily Launchpad revenue has significantly dropped nearly 85% from a peak of close to $14 million at the beginning of the year, currently standing at about $2 million. However, competitors have only posed a threat to Pump's position for a brief period, failing to bring substantial challenges. This aligns with our initial report's prediction regarding the fleeting challenges posed by Bonk and Raydium: even amid periodic trading volume contractions, Pump has maintained a structural advantage, dominating industry activity.

The acquisition of Padre supports the view that Pump intends to expand beyond Solana into a multi-chain ecosystem, providing support for BNB ecosystem assets through the Padre frontend. This also aligns with our earlier prediction that Pump would eventually acquire a terminal or terminal-related asset to strengthen user acquisition channels and integrate more user journeys.

Aside from these actions, the team has recently maintained a low-profile approach. A call with investors is currently planned, but as of the time of writing, it has not yet taken place, so more detailed information may be disclosed later.

The leadership team has also expressed interest in the broader ICM (Initial Community Fundraising) category, although we believe this is not the core area of Pump's current brand positioning or product advantages. Pump initially attempted the Believe model but failed to gain actual market attention. Meanwhile, MetaDAO has become the dominant player in the "high-quality founders + community" fundraising space.

Moreover, the culture and structure of ICM seem to be less aligned with Pump's brand positioning. Pump's brand core revolves around speculation, speed, and the meme culture of creators, rather than long-term governance or Futarchy-based systems. If Pump wants to succeed in the ICM space, they need to lean towards a structure that emphasizes governance and attract non-crypto teams looking to operate on-chain. However, this does not entirely align with the needs and positioning of Pump's current users and creators. Although theoretically, if the team can take action, ICM could bring some potential rewards, we believe this is more of a secondary or optional direction rather than a natural extension of Pump's existing flywheel effect in 2026.

Looking ahead to 2026, the main issues Pump faces are concentrated in several areas: whether it can ultimately establish an incentive-compatible creator token model, whether it can achieve substantial multi-chain market expansion through Padre, how to manage the risks of token unlocks and declining revenue visibility, and which product vertical to focus on as a primary effort. Currently, Pump's strategy seems to be scattered across multiple directions, including streaming, ICM, and mobile.

At some point in the future, the team may need to clarify its focus on a core breakthrough. For most of 2025, this breakthrough seemed to be streaming, but this has now become less clear.

The bigger question is whether Pump can still attract larger creators from outside the crypto space. This may require redesigning the creator token flywheel mechanism to provide stronger, longer-term incentives to support viral spread beyond the crypto-native user base. Pump has the basic conditions to achieve this goal. The Bagwork craze of 2025 briefly showcased the potential for success of this model, when Pump seemed to be on the verge of crossing the chasm.

Additionally, Pump still has ample room to expand its product suite. One strategic direction the team should seriously consider is entering the iGaming (online gambling) or casino-related verticals. Adopting a model similar to Kick or Stake aligns naturally with Pump's speculation-driven user base. This direction would deeply synergize with its meme coin and streaming strategic goals, and the profitability potential in this area has already been validated.

Shuffle's net gaming revenue and weekly lottery distributions demonstrate the immense potential of this field when executed successfully.

Pump's mobile application is another underutilized advantage. Expanding deeper into mobile can broaden user acquisition channels, making the product more accessible to mainstream users while providing creators with more monetization scenarios. If combined with iGaming, this could not only significantly expand Pump's potential audience but also strengthen the existing successful elements of the platform.

Despite the uncertainties, Pump remains one of the most resilient consumer applications in this cycle, maintaining its dominance even as the overall market landscape changes. Achieving substantial progress in any key direction could trigger a significant shift in market sentiment and help Pump break through, attracting a broader audience of non-crypto-native users.

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