Pre-order holders of Solana‘s Chapter 2 mobile phone briefly had the chance to profit from the unreleased device, as meme coin projects sent via airdrop events exceeded the phone’s cost for a short time. In April, two cat-themed meme coin projects, Cat in a dog’s world (MEW) and Maneki (MANEKI), initially sent tokens worth $450 to the crypto wallets of those who pre-ordered the new Chapter 2 device.
Chapter 2 Covers Its Costs
On April 1st, the team behind MEW distributed 37,600 tokens as an airdrop to each phone owner. According to CoinGecko, this airdrop event reached $334 at its peak price of $0.0089 after the airdrop. Similarly, on April 24th, each phone owner received a total of 5,199 MANEKI tokens via an airdrop event, and this token reached its peak price of $0.269 on April 25th.
When combined with other meme coin projects including Wuffi (WUFFI), which distributed 114,000 tokens to Chapter 2 wallets, the airdrop events sent tokens worth a total of $480 to the phone owners; this allowed them to pay for the device and even earn an additional $30.
However, the value of the meme coin projects has since declined. The MEW airdrop event is now worth only $220 at current prices, while the value of the MANEKI airdrop has dropped to $124. Pre-ordering Chapter 2 devices required buyers to link a Solana wallet address, meaning the tokens distributed in the airdrop events were available to owners before the phone arrived.
Airdrop Events in the Solana Ecosystem
Owners of Solana’s first mobile device, Saga, also received the same amount of Maneki in their wallets. Solana Saga was controversially launched last May amid numerous reviews detailing technical issues and usability concerns.
However, a significant market process for the phones began in December when they realized a strange arbitrage opportunity offered by a meme coin rally for Bonk (BONK). Between November 15th and December 15th last year, BONK’s price increased by more than 1100%. The value of the airdrop event, which distributed 30,000 BONK at the highest prices, exceeded $1,150, drawing attention to a value $551 higher than the $599 price tag set for Saga.
