Jupiter & Helium Expose Token Buyback “Meta” — Why It Never Works in Crypto

Jupiter and Helium are forcing a difficult but increasingly unavoidable conversation in crypto: token buybacks often look effective on paper, yet fail when supply dynamics overwhelm demand.

In recent weeks, both projects have moved to reassess buyback programs after spending tens of millions of dollars with little visible impact on token prices, exposing a broader structural problem across DeFi.

Buybacks vs. Supply: Why Helium and Jupiter Are Changing Course

Helium confirmed in early January that it has halted HNT buybacks funded by Helium Mobile revenue, despite generating $3.4 million in October 2025 alone.

Founder and CEO Amir Haleem said the market showed little response to open-market purchases, prompting the team to redirect capital toward subscriber growth, hardware expansion, and increased carrier offload usage.

an update on HNT buybacks: the market doesn’t seem to care about projects buying their tokens back off the market, so we are going to stop wasting our money under the current conditions

Helium + Mobile generated $3.4M in October alone and I’d rather we use that money to grow the…

— amir 🇺🇸 (@amirhaleem) January 2, 2026

Helium had shifted to daily automated buybacks in late 2025, burning tokens purchased with revenue from mobile subscriptions and network data usage.

That program followed earlier treasury-funded burns and was designed to tie real business activity to token supply reduction. While data credit burns from network usage remain in place, buybacks tied to mobile revenue have now been paused.

Buybacks $70 Million
Unlocks $1.2 Billion

Someone who is good at the economy please help me budget this, my token is dying pic.twitter.com/LnInIM0985

— Wazz (@WazzCrypto) January 3, 2026

Jupiter is facing a similar reckoning, as the Solana-based DEX aggregator spent more than $70 million on JUP buybacks in 2025, funded by roughly half of its protocol fee revenue.

With JUP trading near $0.21, down almost 90% from its early-2024 high, Jupiter founder Siong publicly asked the community whether buybacks should be halted.

what do you all think if we stop the JUP buyback?

we spent more than 70m on buyback last year and the price obviously didn’t move much.

we can use the 70m to give out for growth incentives for existing and new users.

should we do it?

— ⚔️ SIONG (@sssionggg) January 3, 2026

The common thread is supply, as Jupiter’s circulating supply has expanded sharply, driven by airdrops, staking rewards, and scheduled unlocks.

Roughly 700 million JUP entered circulation through Jupuary 2025 alone, while ongoing ASR rewards added persistent inflation, with buybacks absorbing only a fraction of that issuance.

As critics across Solana DeFi have pointed out, buying tokens in the open market does little when new supply consistently exceeds what is being removed. In that environment, buybacks become exit liquidity rather than long-term value capture.

This dynamic has fueled a broader critique of what some describe as “chart painting.” Buybacks can create short-term support or narrative momentum, but without structural demand, they struggle to hold.

We have now gone from “buybacks are great” to “buybacks don’t work”

Have we you considered the following:
– your token is just overvalued

– buybacks don’t offset issuance (unlocks)

– Expected buybacks are on future revenue, revenue is reflexive

– discount assigned for “off…

— Infra | Raydium (@0xINFRA) January 3, 2026

Why Buybacks Alone Struggle to Support Crypto Tokens

Several market participants argue that buybacks only work when they are paired with reasons to hold the token, such as mandatory utility, reduced emissions, or direct participation in cash flows. Otherwise, traders simply sell into predictable buying pressure.

buybacks are an inherently pessimistic mechanism

they imply: we don't have a better use for the cash than to paint the chart in the short term (in the hopes that the chart works out long term)

it's an implicit binary option where you are in a sense trying to bootstrap the…

— mert | helius (@mert) January 3, 2026

At the same time, defenders of buybacks note they are not inherently flawed. In traditional finance, buybacks are meant to return excess capital when equity is undervalued, not to offset aggressive dilution.

In crypto, however, tokens rarely represent ownership, and future buybacks are discretionary rather than guaranteed.

For Helium, the challenge is aligning its growing off-chain business with on-chain value. The network now supports nearly 600,000 mobile subscribers and generates steady data credit burns through carrier offload.

The team’s current strategy prioritizes expanding real usage, with the expectation that higher network activity will eventually strengthen token economics. Buybacks remain an option, but only once growth and cash flows materially outpace issuance.

Jupiter’s situation is more complex, as it operates one of the most profitable DeFi platforms, with deep liquidity, large TVL, and a growing suite of products, including perps, lending, and a mobile wallet. Yet JUP remains largely optional.

Analysts argue that without tighter integration into the protocol’s core functions, buybacks alone cannot absorb inflation or anchor value.

Proposals circulating within the ecosystem focus on reducing emissions, tying rewards to revenue, and making JUP an asset for serious users rather than a passive governance token.