Monad: What it is, the price action, and Coinbase implications
Monad's Launch: Is the Hype Justified by the Numbers?
Monad, the Layer 1 blockchain promising Ethereum-compatible performance at scale, finally launched its mainnet on November 24, 2025. The launch was immediately followed by listings on major exchanges like Coinbase, Bybit, Upbit, and Bithumb, a move clearly designed to maximize initial visibility. Monad goes live as MON lists on Coinbase, and other exchanges - AMBCrypto The public sale, a key indicator of retail interest, raised a substantial $269 million from 85,820 individual buyers. But does the initial data support the long-term viability of this project, or is it another case of crypto exuberance masking underlying issues?
Initial Trading Data: A Closer Look
The Monad public sale on Coinbase between November 17-22, 2025, was, by all accounts, a success. Oversubscription hit 144%, pulling in over $188 million in demand. Each MON token was priced at $0.025. At launch, 10.83 billion MON tokens (10.8% of the total 100 billion supply) were unlocked. The initial price action was volatile: a brief spike above $0.03 in the first hour, followed by a dip to $0.023, and then a partial recovery. By late afternoon, the price stabilized around the $0.024-$0.025 range. Now, this is where things get interesting.
The immediate listing on major exchanges created an artificial demand surge. It’s typical for new tokens to experience this kind of volatility, but the question is whether the underlying technology and adoption rate can sustain any long-term price appreciation. Early trading data suggests a struggle to maintain even the initial offering price. Is this a sign of weak hands selling off their initial allocation, or a more fundamental lack of confidence in the project's long-term prospects? And is the tokenomics structure, specifically the large initial unlock, designed to benefit early insiders at the expense of retail investors? These are questions that require further scrutiny.
Community Sentiment vs. Token Distribution
The oversubscription of the public sale undeniably points to significant investor interest. However, anecdotal data from online communities reveals some early concerns about insider concentration and the project's fully diluted valuation. (The fully diluted valuation represents the total market cap if all tokens were in circulation.) This is a recurring theme in crypto launches, and it's one that investors should be acutely aware of.
I've looked at hundreds of these token launches, and the level of pre-launch hype surrounding Monad was unusually high. It’s almost as if the marketing budget was larger than the actual development budget. The launch of Monad staking, offering an initial APR of 15–16%, is another tactic to incentivize holding, but it doesn't address the fundamental issue of token distribution. How much of the total supply is controlled by the development team, early investors, and advisors? Until that information is transparently disclosed, it's difficult to assess the true long-term sustainability of the MON token. What measures are being taken to prevent whale manipulation, and are these measures sufficient to protect the average retail investor?
The Verdict: Too Early to Call, Data Still Needed
The launch of Monad is a classic case study in crypto hype versus reality. The technology behind Monad – parallel execution, low-latency state transitions – sounds promising, but the initial tokenomics and trading data raise some red flags. The market will ultimately decide whether Monad can live up to its promises, but for now, investors should proceed with caution.