‘Crypto Is Sexy’: Is Iggy Azalea for Real?

This week’s celebrity meme coin craze took a fresh twist late Tuesday when Australian rapper Iggy Azalea—best known for the hit song “Fancy” a decade ago—launched her own MOTHER has charted massive gains since Azalea tweeted it out on Tuesday, jumping more than 22,000% to a current price above $0.015 and a market cap topping $15 million. More than $150 million worth of the Solana-based token has been traded in less than a day amid a flurry of tweets, retweets, and Twitter Space appearances by the musician.“Crypto is sexy,” she Azalea’s MOTHER token arrived amid confusion and controversy. Azalea had been linked to crypto promoter Sahil Arora, who helped media personality and Olympic gold medalist Caitlyn Jenner Don’t disappoint your mother… 3S8qX1MsMqRbiwKg2cQyx7nis1oHMgaCuc9c4VfvVdPN pic.twitter.com/G8x2mms47P— IGGY AZALEA (@IGGYAZALEA) May 29, 2024Ahead of the MOTHER launch Tuesday, Azalea did much the same, tweeting that she “was in contact” with Arora Arora allegedly took in approximately $380,000 worth of pre-sale funds to launch a token called IGGY that he claimed was for Azalea, but it has yet to be airdropped to people who sent in money.Amid the Tuesday night trading frenzy around MOTHER, Azalea hosted the Spaces and spent hours interacting with Crypto Twitter denizens, presenting herself as someone who was new to building in the crypto space but wanted to make a lasting impact—to not pump and dump, in other words, or quickly cash in on her fame before disappearing.“Learning as I go, but just want shit to actually be a moment in popular culture [and] a map of how to do something the right way,” Even so, there are lingering questions around the MOTHER drop. Azalea has said that she holds 3% of the token supply, but blockchain data startup Bubblemaps discovered via on-chain data that about 20% of the supply was “Meanwhile, because this is my concept/coin—I’m somehow supposed to [bear] responsibility for what random [people] do with their wallets,” Some of crypto’s biggest personalities appeared to co-sign Azalea’s entry into the space, either sharing fawning tweets about her approach or giving her the benefit of the doubt amid skepticism—both generally about celebrity meme coins, and specifically in relation to the drama around Arora and her apparent efforts to separate herself from the controversial promoter.• said she pays people in crypto• is aware she isnt as knowledgeable about the space but wants to learn• thinks crypto is interesting & not going away, more to crypto than just trading• memes are like internet culture & community, would be down to come to a conference https://t.co/GUnaxfw6S0— Ansem ️ (@blknoiz06) May 29, 2024“Iggy Azalea the most educated celebrity coming into this space,” “She lowkey so valid bro,” wrote DeGods project creator Rohun “Frank” Vora.Granted, not everyone assumed the best from the entertainer. Some did you see this? pic.twitter.com/okGcjNApRL— Neeraj K. Agrawal (@NeerajKA) May 29, 2024MOTHER is Given the constant twists and turns around this week’s new celebrity coins and the vibe shifts that followed, we’ll see if the crypto world is still embracing Azalea by the time she wakes up and torches a bit more MOTHER for the meme coin cause.