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This week, Hailey Welch sought to capitalize on her internet fame by launching her own memecoin. Pexels

A memecoin launched by Hailey Welch, the internet sensation known as "Hawk Tuah Girl," has plunged within hours of going live, losing 95% of its value.

This week, Welch sought to capitalize on her internet fame by launching her own memecoin, which are cryptocurrencies inspired by viral memes or pop culture, similar to Dogecoin and Pepecoin.

Hawkcoin, trading under the ticker $HAWK, briefly soared to a market value of US$490 million shortly after its launch on Dec. 4. However, a significant sell-off soon followed, dropping its value to just US$26.4 million, News.com reported.

Welch, a 22-year-old influencer and host of the Talk Tuah podcast on Jake Paul's network, is now facing accusations of insider trading following the disastrous launch. Some critics have speculated that the coin is part of a "pump-and-dump" scheme, where value is artificially inflated before it is quickly sold for profit.

In a post on X, Welch defended the project, stating, "Team hasn't sold one token and not 1 KOL was given 1 free token."

She also explained the efforts made to prevent "snipers" -- entities who buy up large amounts of a token at launch to sell at a profit -- by implementing high fees.

"We tried to stop snipers as best we could through high fee's in the start of launch on @MeteoraAG," she stated. "Fee's have now been dropped."

Before the launch, Welch had told Fortune that Hawkcoin was "not just a cash grab." However, less than 24 hours after its launch, at least one investor has filed a complaint with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

As the fallout from the crash continues, Burwick Law, a firm specializing in digital consumer protection, has called on those impacted to come forward. The firm posted on X, "If you lost money on $HAWK, contact our firm to learn about your legal rights. Our firm represents thousands of nft and token investors in securities matters."

According to Coin Telegraph, data from Bubblemaps and Dexscreener revealed that a combination of insider wallets and snipers controlled 80 to 90% of Hawkcoin's supply at launch. One buyer, for instance, snatched up 17.5% of the total supply -- worth approximately US$993,000 -- just seconds after the coin went live, later selling 135.8 million tokens for a profit of US$1.3 million, the report stated.

As the controversy intensified, online crypto investigator Coffeezilla criticized Welch and her team, calling it "the worst tokenomics I have ever seen... and it's a scam. You guys generated over a million in fees while y'all's fans got rug pulled."

In response, a member of the Hawkcoin team assured that the project was not a scam, stating, "We're really trying to do something here and not just do it for one day."