CashboardGlossary · Memecoins
What is a rug pull?
A rug pull is when a token's creators or insiders pull the liquidity or dump their supply, leaving everyone else holding a token nobody will buy.
How does a rug pull work?
In the classic version the creator seeds a pool, promotes the token, then withdraws the liquidity and walks off with the paired SOL or ETH. The token still exists. There is just nothing left to sell it into.
Most rugs today are quieter. In a soft rug, insiders who bought a large share of supply at launch, often spread across dozens of bundled wallets, sell slowly into whatever demand shows up. Contract rugs hide the trap in code: unlimited minting, a blacklist for sellers, or a transfer tax the owner can raise to 100 percent. On Solana, a live mint or freeze authority does the same job.
Launchpads closed some of these doors. On pump.fun every token has a fixed 1 billion supply, mint and freeze authority are disabled, and the liquidity created at graduation is burned rather than left with the creator. That pushed the risk toward who holds the supply, which is why trenchers look at the top holders before anything else.
Imagine five wallets funded from the same source buying 40 percent of a new token in its first block. Others pile in and the price climbs. Then all five sell inside a minute and the price falls 85 percent. The contract was clean. The holder list was the rug.
Also called: rug, rugged, exit scam.
Where does a rug pull show up in Cashboard?
Cashboard does not score tokens for rug risk and does not list individual holders. Token terminal shows GeckoTerminal's figures for one token: holder count, the top 10 wallets' share, the deployer's share, and mint, freeze and honeypot tags. Launchpad radar shows each new token's age, bonding-curve progress and whether it has graduated. Trending on-chain puts 24h volume next to pool liquidity for the pools it ranks. Thin liquidity next to heavy volume is the pattern to be careful with. Base launches shows that same pair for Clanker tokens, and a holder count, not a list, for Zora coins. The Raydium pools widget ranks only Raydium's biggest pools by volume, TVL or APR. A fresh token appears there only once it is large, and you cannot search for a single token.
Frequently asked questions
How can you spot a possible rug pull?
Start with who holds the supply: a handful of wallets holding a big share, especially wallets funded from the same address, is the most common warning. Then check whether liquidity is burned or locked, whether mint or freeze authority is still active, and whether the contract can block or tax sells. Passing every check still does not make a token safe.
Where can you read more about rug pull?
Related terms
Last reviewed . Market data in Cashboard comes from the providers named on each widget and may be delayed. Nothing here is financial advice.