Kekius Maximus falls as Elon Musk swaps X avi

Kekius Maximus meme coins on Ethereum and Solana crashed after Elon Musk changed his profile photo and X page name.

Kekius Maximus, a meme coin used on Ethereum (ETH), dropped from its $380 million market cap on January 2 after Musk removed the character from the name and avatar of his X account.

The Ethereum-based Kekius Maximus token was launched on December 14 as a fun mix of crypto jargon and pop culture. “Cake” is crypto slang for something funny or ridiculous, while “Maximus” refers to Maximus Decimus Meridius, the main character in Ridley Scott’s Gladiator (2000).

Musk briefly adopted the name Kekius Maximus for Page X, referencing it in a video game-related tweet and again on New Year’s Eve. This interest caused the Ethereum-based Kekius Maximus token to rise more than 30-fold, from $0.01 to $0.39.

Kekius Maximus fell to $0.07 and a market cap of $77 million shortly after investors noticed Musk’s changes on social media, according to DEX Screener. As the excitement faded, imitation tokens on Solana (SOL) also collapsed. Musk announced that the name change was made to focus on pressing US problems after a rented Tesla Cybertruck exploded in front of the Trump Hotel in Las Vegas.

We have now confirmed that the explosion was caused by very large fireworks and/or a bomb carried in the bed of the rented Cybertruck and was unrelated to the vehicle.

All vehicle telemetry was positive at the time of the explosion. https://t.co/HRjb87YbaJ

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 1, 2025

Kekius Maximus winners

Like many meme coins, Kekius Maximus turned early investors into millionaires, at least on paper. However, not all 24,000 token holders were able to profit before the token’s price crashed.

One trader cashed in a $2.3 million profit, but another trader missed out on a 45,906% return. The user purchased $66 worth of Kekius Maximus and booked $201,000. LookOnChain data confirms investor could make $3 million instead