Hunter Biden’s laptop controversy gets a memecoin afterlife

[Update, Sept. 9, 1 p.m. UTC: Updates LAPTOP’s price performance and volume after its first hour of trading.]

Hunter Biden’s LAPTOP memecoin fell 95.7% in its hour of trading on Wednesday, as the son of former US President Joe Biden officially entered the market for politically themed cryptocurrencies.

The token, issued on Ethereum layer-2 network Base, traded at $4.36 at 1:00 pm UTC, after opening at $199.50, according to CoinGecko data. It recorded more than $3 million in trading volume.

“The symbol they used to try to end me is now a symbol of resilience, redemption and recovery,” Biden said in an X post on Wednesday, responding to public backlash.

Biden also said he understood the cynicism around memecoins, called President Donald Trump’s token a “grift” and warned buyers not to expect him or anyone else to make LAPTOP more valuable.

The memecoin is promoted as an attempt to reclaim the “laptop narrative,” which centers on a MacBook that Biden reportedly left at a Delaware repair shop in 2019. The New York Post published emails and other files purported to have come from the device before the 2020 presidential election. Trump allies used the material against Hunter Biden and his father, then-presidential candidate Joe Biden.