The meme coin’s developers allegedly blacklisted the first address to buy the wildly popular Pepe token.

A Twitter user by the username @0xBobie shared a BSC scan screenshot showing an address, 0xAf2358e98683265cBd3a48509123d390df54534, had been blacklisted for suspicion of being an MEV bot.

Lmeow, so the first address which bought $PEPE got blacklisted by the dev 4 days ago pic.twitter.com/fIbpD3hQYK

— Bobie(🪬.🪬) (@0xBobie) April 19, 2023

MEV bots can profit from their information and influence over transaction ordering by employing various techniques such as front-running, back-running, arbitrage, and liquidation.

Their growth has also prompted worries about Ethereum’s security and fairness, as they can hurt users by raising gas fees, front-running transactions, and generating network congestion.

The move to blacklist addresses suspected of being MEV bots comes at a time when PEPE has become one of the fastest-moving trading objects on the Ethereum network, right alongside fellow meme coin newcomer Wojak (WOJAK).

Per data from EigenPhi, PEPE registered a transaction volume of about $250 million in the last week, with WOJAK having slightly less than half of that at $120 million.

More importantly, EigenPhi also had data indicating that MEV robots profited substantially from PEPE and WOJAK trades. According to the DeFi data platform, an MEV bot controlled by a user going by the pseudonym jaredfromsubway.eth made off with about $1.5 million in profits from PEPE trading pairs and more than $2.8 million in WOJAK.

As reported by crypto.news, jaredfromsubway.eth’s MEV bot has been very successful the last few days, raking in more than $2.3 million in cumulative profits.

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PEPE’s value grew by more than 1,000% in the last few days, according to data from CoinMarketCap.

PEPE price movement | Source: CoinMarketCap

The meme coin’s market value had increased to around $146 million by April 19 and had attracted more than 24,500 unique holders.

Additionally, PEPE, launched on April 16, had grown by over 21,000% in the last four days, clocking $30 million in Uniswap trading volumes and attaining a market valuation of $33 million by April 18.

Furthermore, the coin’s trade volume varied between $152 million and $164 million, a 174% increase in the previous 24 hours. It has a total circulating quantity of 429 trillion, of which 93.1% has already been burned, renounced, and sent to the liquidity pool, leaving only 6.9% for CEX listings, bridges, and liquidity pools.

Read more: Ethereum’s staked supply could increase while a price drop is expected