Arthur Hayes dumps WLD days after Maelstrom's AI IPO pitch

Maelstrom co-founder Arthur Hayes said he sold his Worldcoin (WLD) holdings just days after his venture capital firm pitched it as one of the cleanest proxies for the AI investment play. "This chart is going in the wrong direction," Hayes posted on X on Saturday, sharing a chart for the SpaceX pre-IPO perpetual futures contract, which had fallen sharply. "Dumped WLD. I'm out. See y'all at the clerb," he added. Just three days earlier, on Wednesday, Maelstrom researcher Lukas Ruppert had described Worldcoin as an "overlooked" bet on "AI mega IPOs," predicting WLD would hit $5 by August. The note sparked a short rally, with WLD topping $0.60 on Friday, but the token has since slid back to $0.40 on Sunday as Hayes told his 800,000 X followers he'd exited. He had previously said on X that he'd hold WLD through the SpaceX IPO on Nasdaq, expected this coming Friday — a timing choice that drew some criticism. WLD has been extremely volatile over the past week. Source: CoinGecko

The 'Holy Trinity is dead' — or is it?

WLD joins a growing list of crypto assets Hayes has flipped on after publicly bullish takes. In March, he predicted Hyperliquid (HYPE) would reach $150 by August, and on June 1 said it would "outperform any other current top ten crypto in USD terms from now until year-end" — then sold his entire position three days later, blaming higher energy prices tied to the Iran war, "inventory restocking," and imminent "mega AI IPOs." Related: Hyperliquid bear turns bullish after losing over $46M shorting HYPE

On May 6, Hayes said Zcash would reach 10% of Bitcoin's price. By June 5, he had offloaded his ZEC stash following a critical vulnerability in its privacy protocol, declaring that the " Holy Trinity " of HYPE, ZEC, and NEAR was "dead." Hayes appears to have walked that back, at least partially. A wallet linked to him bought back around 33,978 HYPE — worth roughly $2 million — on Monday, after the token fell 26% in the wake of his June 4 sale, according to Arkham Intelligence. Cointelegraph reached out to Maelstrom for comment and did not receive an immediate response. Magazine: Korea probes Polymarket users, crypto PACs sweep primaries: Hodler's Digest