Justin Sun-Linked Wallets Acquire 5% Stake in Lighter’s LIT Token with $33M Purchase

Justin Sun's linked wallets have made significant moves in the cryptocurrency space, accumulating $33 million worth of LIT, which has pushed Sun’s stake to over 5% of the token's circulating supply following its launch.

Key Takeaways

Justin Sun's wallets purchased around $33 million in LIT tokens, controlling over 5% of the circulating supply.
Four wallets associated with Sun received 1.6 million LIT each soon after the token generation event.
LIT has faced volatility since its launch due to liquidity withdrawals and profit-taking by early holders.
The performance of LIT will depend on factors like adoption and revenue-sharing execution in the DeFi space.

Justin Sun emerges as major LIT holder after $33M post-launch buy

Accumulation of LIT Tokens by Sun's Wallets

In a recent analysis on January 1, on-chain researcher MLM revealed that wallets connected to Justin Sun accumulated a substantial amount of LIT tokens following the token generation event. Each of the four wallets received approximately 1.6 million LIT, totaling around 6.4 million LIT, which was valued at about $17 million at that time.

These wallets received funds shortly after Lighter’s airdrop allocation closed, suggesting that these purchases were more related to liquidity provisioning than airdrop farming.

"It appears that four wallets linked to @justinsuntron each received exactly 1.6M LIT (~$4.3M) at TGE, likely as part of an LLP deposit deal. I couldn’t find any Justin Sun–linked wallets that farmed Lighter beforehand, and all four were funded roughly 34–50 minutes after the…" — MLM (@mlmabc) January 1, 2026

Additionally, Justin Sun reportedly deposited nearly $200 million into Lighter’s Liquidity Provider Program, later withdrawing around $38 million, with approximately $33 million used to acquire an extra 13.25 million LIT on the market. This gives his wallets a total of 14.89 million LIT, equivalent to about $39.8 million, representing around 5.32% of the circulating supply and 1.33% of the total supply.

Furthermore, approximately $5.5 million remains in spot balances associated with these wallets. There are indicators that similar strategies may be used by other large participants in the liquidity pool. For instance, a wallet that deposited $50 million USDC into the program received 874,875 LIT tokens a month earlier, though it's uncertain if this wallet is directly linked to Sun.

LIT Challenges Following the Airdrop

Launched on December 30, LIT serves as the native token for Lighter, a high-performance decentralized exchange (DEX) for perpetual futures built on an Ethereum zk-rollup. The initial launch featured a 25% airdrop allocated to early users and liquidity providers, leading to an immediate circulating supply of approximately 250 million tokens.

The tokenomics structure divides the supply evenly between ecosystem participants and insiders, with investors holding 24% and the team possessing 26%. Both groups are constrained by a one-year cliff along with three years of linear vesting. LIT aims to create value through various mechanisms, including fee recycling, buybacks, staking, governance, and access to premium features.

Since its debut, LIT has experienced downward pressure due to liquidity withdrawals and profit-taking actions typical among new tokens with broad distributions. Initially trading around $3.40, LIT’s value quickly fluctuated, dipping roughly 30% to around $2.45–$2.80 shortly after launch.

Despite the volatility, Lighter continues to show strong operational metrics, reporting $3.7 billion in 30-day trading volume and about $101 million in annualized fees. The long-term viability and success of LIT depend on user adoption, effective revenue-sharing, and growth in the decentralized finance (DeFi) perpetual market.