Pump-and-dump timeline
A pump and dump has four phases: quiet accumulation, promotion that drives the price up, distribution as the operator sells into the demand created, and collapse when promotion stops. This tool lets you move through a modelled campaign day by day and see what each phase looks like from the outside and from the operator's position.
What the four phases look like from outside
The critical asymmetry in a pump and dump is that the operator knows which phase the scheme is in and nobody else does. Every buyer during promotion believes they are early. The chart looks identical during promotion — when buying is still arriving — and during distribution, when the operator is selling into it. The difference is invisible from the price alone.
| Phase | What the operator does | What is visible from outside | What would give it away |
|---|---|---|---|
| Accumulation | Buys quietly, or takes shares directly from the issuer under an exemption | Nothing. Price flat, volume near normal, no coverage | Transfer agent records and any beneficial ownership filing that should have been made |
| Promotion | Funds a campaign; buys nothing | Price rising sharply on heavy volume; enthusiastic material appearing across channels | Promotional disclaimers naming a payer; no corresponding filing to justify the move |
| Distribution | Sells the accumulated position into the demand the promotion created | Price still rising, then flattening, on the heaviest volume of the campaign | Brokerage records; ownership filings; the promotion continuing while insiders exit |
| Collapse | Nothing. There is nothing left to do | Price falling steadily, usually below where it started, volume draining away | By now it is obvious, and it is also too late |
Why the operator does not sell at the top
Because selling is what stops the rise. An operator holding six million shares cannot exit at the peak price — putting that much stock on the offer removes the very scarcity that produced the price. Account records in charged cases show selling spread across the second half of the campaign, at an average well below the high.
This matters for reading the chart. The peak is not the moment of distribution; it is the moment distribution overwhelmed the remaining promotional demand. By the time the price turns, most of the selling has already happened.
The model behind the numbers
The campaign shown is fictional and arithmetically consistent: a shell trading at $0.42 with a 12 million share float, an operator holding six million shares acquired at an average of $0.38, a $250,000 promotion budget, and distribution spread across the back half of the campaign. Nothing here is drawn from any actual company.
Real campaigns vary in every parameter — duration, magnitude, how much of the float the operator holds, whether supporting trades are used to build the chart. What does not vary is the shape, and that shape is what the tool is for.