Central African Republic launches memecoin as experiment, according to president's X account

The official X account of the President of the Central African Republic announced that the country has launched a memecoin as part of an experiment to see whether it can benefit national development.

“Today, we are launching $CAR — an experiment designed to show how something as simple as a meme can unite people, support national development, and put the Central African Republic on the world stage in a unique way,” CAR President Faustin-Archange Touadéra’s X account wrote Sunday.

The Block has reached out to the Central African Republic government to confirm whether the memecoin is a legitimate endeavor by its government.

The CAR memecoin is described as “the official meme of the Central African Republic” on Solana launchpad pump.fun , where it is being traded for around $0.45. As of 8:10 p.m. on Sunday, ET, the Central African Republic memecoin had about $374.4 million in market capitalization.

A follow-up social media post included a video announcement of the memecoin launch apparently featuring President Touadéra himself.

“The Central African Republic has always believed in the power and the importance of a strong community,” the video announcement said.

While the memecoin project also created a dedicated X account to share daily updates and announcements on the token, it has since been suspended by the social media platform. President Touadéra’s X account said the project is working with the platform to revive the account as soon as possible.

The Central African Republic made headlines in 2022 when it became the second country in the world to accept bitcoin as a legal tender, following El Salvador. 

Later that year, the country, under President Touadéra’s leadership, launched Sango Coin as its national cryptocurrency to create a digital economy based on the tokenization of its minerals.