ExchangeAltcoinsOpinion
|7 min ReadHow We Made +$50M Sniping Shitcoins On DEXs
Carter Hayes
Senior Analyst
Published
Jan 16, 2026
In August 2020, my brother was teaching IT at the university, and I had just wrapped up a 1.5-year stint as a product manager at an insurance company. Crypto had been struggling for years, recovering slowly from the COVID crash. Our portfolio barely reached $50K, and though we had a few wins on Binance Launchpad, the space seemed grim.
Then we started hearing about a new protocol called Uniswap. Friends were making quick profits, sometimes 3–4x in a matter of hours. We didn’t understand it, but something felt different. A friend shared a story of how a bot made $500K when bZx launched its token on Uniswap. My brother and I were shocked. How was that even possible. We were completely new to Solidity and didn't understand how blockchain really worked.
The First Snipes: From Novices to Winners
By late August, we were on holiday in Spain when my brother started learning Solidity. We wanted to try sniping on Uniswap, and the opportunity came when a new token, 20K).
The token launched, and we managed to snipe 8 percent of the listing supply. Within 30 minutes, I logged into Uniswap and sold. The profit was 60 ETH (~50K, so this felt like easy money.
Two days later, we saw another opportunity with 135K). Our first six-figure profit, all in less than an hour. The adrenaline rush was real.
Uniswap was blowing up. The volume surged. Crypto degens flooded the platform. We knew this wouldn’t last, and we had to improve our strategy. That’s when we decided to dive deeper into understanding sniping mechanics.
Learning the Mechanics: Mempool Sniping
To list a token on Uniswap, the team must add liquidity to a pool. Initially, we watched for that Add-Liquidity transaction to hit the chain, then we sent our buy order, but we were always one block late. Some competitors were getting in the same block as the liquidity add.
We realized that with an Ethereum node, we could monitor the public mempool and see pending transactions before they hit the chain. This was the game-changer. By September, we were sniping like pros.
Watch the mempool for a pending Add Liquidity transaction.
Send a buy transaction with the same gas price.
Aim to be included in the same block right after the liquidity add.
A New Era of Sniping: Upgrading the Bot
By mid-September, we had upgraded our bot. My brother, still teaching IT, sometimes had to sneak off to manage the sniping operation in the middle of his class. COVID made it easier, as everything was remote. He would tell his students to do some research for 10 minutes, while he managed the snipes.
Our next target was 270K).
But the pressure didn’t stop there. Just a few days later, we sniped LINA (+80 ETH) and 100K.
Then came a surprise: the Uniswap airdrop. Any address that interacted with Uniswap was eligible. Thanks to our massive sniping activity, we had many eligible addresses. Each one received around $20K, and my brother cashed out mid-six-figures. This was the big break.
Upgrading the Smart Contracts and Infrastructure
As we started making more snipes, we faced new challenges. Our initial strategy relied on setting a buy limit, but liquidity wasn’t always predictable. Sometimes, teams added liquidity in smaller amounts than expected, and our buy limits were off.
My brother redesigned the system. Instead of using fixed buy limits, we now bought as much as we could until we reached our target tokens for 1 ETH. We were the first to implement this method, which gave us a massive edge.
We also realized that many teams would list tokens with different pairings: ETH, USDT, or USDC. To tackle this, my brother created a smart contract that could buy the tokens regardless of the pairings. Speed was critical, so we set up Ethereum nodes in multiple regions to outpace competitors. We found that nodes in North Virginia were consistently the fastest, as most Ethereum infrastructure was located there.
Our sniping strategy was becoming unstoppable. We were on a roll and the profits kept coming.
Polkastarter and DeFi: The New Sniping Era
By October, things started to slow down. Uniswap launches became less frequent, and we had a solid stack of ETH to sit on. But then, in December, Polkastarter emerged. The first sale, SpiderDAO, had a 2.5 ETH buy limit per wallet, but we quickly realized the limit was only on the UI, not the contract itself. We exploited this and bought 50 percent of the sale, then sniped it at launch, earning $500K in profit.
The DeFi boom was back, and we capitalized on every opportunity, even making huge profits from synthetic asset arbitrage. As the Polkastarter era took off, we were right there, printing massive gains.
By the end of 2020, my brother had resigned from his job, and we were both full-time snipers, living in Dubai and making millions. Our mindset was simple. If there’s an opportunity, we take it.
The BSC Era and Our New Edge
By mid-February 2021, the BSC ecosystem was thriving. We shifted focus to Binance Smart Chain, where competition was less intense. Our first BSC snipe, 80K profit, and our second, 480K).
In March, we were fully entrenched in BSC. Snipes like 2M in just an hour. The competition on Ethereum had become too fierce, but BSC was our playground.
The End of the Sniping Era
By May 2021, the sniping game had changed. New anti-snipe measures were introduced, but we adapted. My brother developed a smart contract that could bypass these measures, and we continued to profit. However, as the competition on Polkastarter and BSC grew, it became harder to maintain our edge.
By June, we decided to liquidate most of our 450. The sniping era was winding down, and we were ready to take a break.
The Final Big Win: Unexpected Profits
In August 2021, we found ourselves randomly selling some 6M windfall. It was a surreal moment that marked the end of our wild sniping journey.
Conclusion
That year was the craziest and most profitable time of our lives. From starting with just $40K to making millions, sniping shitcoins on DEXs was a rollercoaster. In total, we sniped over 200 coins on more than 10 chains. The experiences and thrills we went through are indescribable.
Thanks for reading. Wishing you the best of luck on your own journey.
Disclaimer: This document is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. The views expressed in this document are not, and should not be taken as, investment advice or recommendations. Recipients should do their own due diligence, taking into account their specific financial circumstances, investment objectives and risk tolerance, which are not considered here, before investing. This document is not an offer, or the solicitation of an offer, to buy or sell any of the assets mentioned.