Pepe Jumps 12% as Arkham Flags $51M in Sun-Linked Wallets

Published October 28, 2026, 10:05 AM PKT. Based on CoinGecko and Binance market data observed October 28, 2026 (primary sources) and reporting by Wu Blockchain citing Arkham data, Crypto Briefing, PANews, TokenPost and Coinlaw, all published October 27-28, 2026 (secondary sources). This is the first MABOnChain standalone article on Pepe.

Pepe rose about 12% on October 28, 2026 to $0.00000484, with $476 million in 24-hour trading volume and a market capitalization of about $2.04 billion, according to CoinGecko data observed at 04:51 UTC. The move put Pepe third in CoinGecko trending searches for the day and made it the strongest large meme coin in a market where Bitcoin traded near $80,900, up 1.7% in 24 hours, according to the same CoinGecko trending snapshot. Binance spot data told the same story: PEPE/USDT gained 11.78% to $0.00000484, with a 24-hour high of $0.00000502 and a low of $0.00000426, on $56.5 million in quote volume, and the daily candle in progress at 04:52 UTC was fresh, ruling out the frozen-ticker trap that has distorted other Binance data this month.

Arkham flags $51.25 million in Sun-linked wallets

The rally followed a whale story that broke on October 27, 2026. Wallets linked or tentatively attributed to Tron founder Justin Sun hold approximately $51.25 million worth of PEPE, equivalent to 2.82% of the token total supply, according to blockchain intelligence platform Arkham, as reported by Wu Blockchain on October 27, 2026. Crypto Briefing reported the same figures on October 27, 2026, adding that the stake could make Sun the largest individual holder of PEPE, while major centralized exchanges still hold the largest shares overall. Coinlaw reported that Canary Capital's pending PEPE exchange-traded fund filing already lists concentrated ownership among the token's main risks, which is the practical reason a single 2.82% holder matters to other holders.

Arkham traced nearly all of the position to two withdrawals from Poloniex, an exchange associated with Sun, according to Coinlaw. The first withdrawal, at 14:29 UTC on October 17, carried 7.2 trillion PEPE worth $28.44 million. The second followed at 15:54 UTC on October 26 with 4.65 trillion tokens worth $20.32 million. Together the transactions amounted to $48.76 million, close to the approximately $51.25 million in holdings attributed to those wallets, although the figures describe different measures: the value of reported transfers and the value of identified holdings. Crypto Briefing added that Sun-linked wallets sent $77 million in stablecoins to Poloniex between October 15 and October 25, and Coinlaw reported that Arkham did not establish that this money paid for the PEPE.

The attribution is tentative, and transfers are not purchases

Three cautions sit on top of the headline figure, and all three come from the same reporting. First, Arkham's attribution is tentative: the platform has labeled or tentatively linked the wallets to Sun, and the reported holdings should not automatically be treated as independently confirmed personal ownership, Hokanews reported on October 27, 2026, summarizing the Wu Blockchain report. Coinlaw added that part of Arkham's total rests on inference, because the firm counts one address beginning 0x721 as likely Sun's on the basis that known Sun wallets funded it with ETH and spUSDT on June 16, 2026. Second, the reported figures alone do not establish the purpose of the transfers or whether they reflect purchases, withdrawals, internal wallet movements or another type of transaction, Hokanews noted. Third, Sun himself has issued no statement about the holdings in the coverage reviewed for this article, and Crypto Briefing stressed that Arkham's work reflects the wallets it has tied to him, not a statement from Sun himself. So far no sales have been reported since the accumulation, Crypto Briefing added, and the tokens appear to be sitting in Sun's attributed wallets rather than on exchanges.

The route the tokens took is also part of the story. Coinlaw reported that Binance hot wallets sent about $20.2 million of PEPE to Poloniex deposit addresses on October 16, then another $20.3 million on October 26, and that some of those tokens passed through HTX and back to Poloniex before reaching Sun's wallets. Crypto Briefing noted the same path through Binance, Poloniex and HTX. For traders, the useful signal from here is any movement from those wallets back toward an exchange, Crypto Briefing wrote, because large deposits to trading venues often come before sales, while tokens left in wallets suggest the holder is staying put.

A dormant whale moves 1.45 trillion PEPE after a year

A second, separate whale move landed on October 28, 2026, hours before this article. According to monitoring by on-chain analyst Ai Yi, PEPE whale address 0x2da...65e69 moved again after a one-year pause, transferring 1.45 trillion PEPE to a new address, PANews reported on October 28, 2026. The address accumulated 4.03 trillion PEPE between May 2023 and August 2024 at a cost as low as $0.000001185, PANews reported, and its remaining tokens currently show $5.106 million in unrealized profit, after having once been up $32.77 million at the end of 2024. The move is a transfer to a new address, not a confirmed sale, and nothing in the PANews report ties this whale to Sun or to the Arkham-flagged wallets. It matters because it shows old, deeply profitable supply waking up on the same day the Sun story broke, which is exactly the kind of supply overhang that can cap a meme coin rally.

Short-term positioning amplified the move overnight. Pepe rose 5.46% in one hour to $0.00000483 on Binance spot PEPE/USDT at 01:37 UTC on October 28, TokenPost reported, with short liquidations totaling $330,000 and long liquidations at $0 across Binance, Bybit and OKX over that hour. At that moment PEPE was up 11.29% over the preceding 24 hours, TokenPost reported. The pattern, a sharp hourly leg driven by short covering rather than fresh spot buying alone, fits a market where the Sun accumulation story gave shorts a reason to exit fast.

What is still far below the surface: the December 2024 high

For all the day's strength, Pepe remains far below its peak. CoinGecko puts the all-time high at $0.00002803 on December 9, 2024, which leaves the current price about 82.7% below that level. The token is up 9.29% over 7 days and 15.66% over 30 days, according to the same CoinGecko snapshot, so the October 28 move extends a month-long recovery rather than starting one. The next test is concrete: CoinPedia's October 27, 2026 price analysis framed the key question as whether buyers can clear $0.00000500 while defending trendline support, and CoinPulseHQ reported on October 22, 2026 that PEPE was testing overhead resistance near $0.0000050. Binance's October 28 high of $0.00000502 touched that zone and fell back to $0.00000484, so the resistance test is live, not settled. What to watch next is equally concrete: any movement from the Arkham-flagged wallets back toward an exchange, any statement from Sun himself, any confirmed sale from the reactivated 1.45 trillion PEPE whale, and whether PEPE holds above $0.00000426, the Binance 24-hour low, on a daily close.

This article is news reporting and is not investment advice.

Sources

• CoinGecko, Pepe price, market cap and volume data (observed October 28, 2026), primary source
• Binance, PEPE/USDT spot data and klines (observed October 28, 2026), primary source
• Wu Blockchain via Arkham, Arkham: Justin Sun-linked wallets hold $51.25M in PEPE, 2.82% of supply (October 27, 2026), secondary source
• Crypto Briefing, Justin Sun Emerges as Top Individual Holder of PEPE With $51.25 Million (October 27, 2026), secondary source
• Coinlaw, Justin Sun Now Holds 2.82% of PEPE, Arkham Data Shows (October 27, 2026), secondary source
• PANews, Whale Moves 1.45T PEPE After a Year-Long Pause (October 28, 2026), secondary source
• TokenPost, Pepe (PEPE) Rises 5.46% in One Hour to $0.00000483 on Binance (October 28, 2026), secondary source
• Hokanews, Justin Sun-Linked Wallets Hold $51.25 Million in PEPE, Arkham Data Shows (October 27, 2026), secondary source