On-chain data show that the owner of the contract deployer of the BALD crypto, which turned out to be a scam within days of its inception, transferred around 2,100 ETH from his personal wallet to Kraken.
The money is the result of a rug pull of liquidity on the decentralised markets where the cryptocurrency was listed, belonging to the layer-2 Base blockchain, developed by the well-known exchange Coinbase.
Let’s look at all the details of the news together.
Summary
Mysterious crypto developer BALD sends 2,100 ETH to Kraken after taking away all liquidity
The latest crypto news speaks of the mysterious developer of the BALD scam coin, who, after completely wiping out all liquidity on the markets where the token was listed, deposited a whopping 2,100 ETH equivalent to $3.87 million on Kraken.
The move comes after the same owner of the deployer contract withdrew 7,000 Ether from the layer-2 Base blockchain, returning the assets to the Ethereum Mainnet.
It is worth noting that this is the largest bridge withdrawal ever recorded on Base according to data from Dune Analytics.
The blockchain analysis company ‘Lookonchain’ showed the details of the scammer’s transfers to the public.
The 7,000 ETH ($12.9 million) that the BALD developer pocketed came essentially from the losses of many traders who trusted the project thinking it was the memecoin of the future in the Base ecosystem.
In reality, prices collapsed in just a few days by more than 90% from the all-time high resulting in the emptying of almost all liquidity in the few markets where the crypto was tradable.
Now the scammer may have made a mistake by sending the ‘fraudulently’ obtained assets to the centralized Kraken exchange.
Indeed, if US regulators believe that their investors were cheated through an unauthorised sale of securities, they could ask Kraken to reveal the identity of the depositor.
However, this remains an unlikely scenario since there are only a few million dollars at stake, so it will likely be ignored by the SEC and US regulators.
Meanwhile, there is no shortage of speculation as to the identity of the developer and owner of the BALD deployment contract.
Many believe that behind this phantom figure is Sam Bankman Fried, the former CEO of the FTX exchange, who was allegedly banned from investing more than $1,000 in crypto markets following heavy financial fraud charges.
The short but intense story of BALD
The crypto scam BALD is a coin belonging to the Layer-2 Base ecosystem, created at the end of July before being listed on the decentralised exchange LeetSwap.
After a few days, it was also added to Uniswap, SushiSwap and SwapBased.
An interesting thing to note is that the first listings arrived when Base, the zk-evm blockchain developed by Coinbase, was still in the testnet phase.
Although the mainnet had not yet been launched, it was still possible to create tokens on the network and issue them on decentralized markets.
The FOMO in the air for the launch of Base and the great liquidity in BALD’s trading pairs attracted the attention of numerous crypto traders who rushed to buy the coin between 30 July and 1 August.
After registering a disproportionate growth of 4,000,000% and enticing many crypto investors to enter, BALD’s developer removed all the cash it had previously placed (35 million), causing a 41% collapse on 1 August.
Numerous other declines followed in the following days, causing the cryptocurrency to lose almost all of its value.
Currently, liquidity on Uniswap V2 in the WETH-BALD pair is only $20,000 with trading volumes of $429 in the last 24 hours.
This marks the debut of the blockchain optimistic rollup Base, which aims to scale Ethereum by offering cheaper and faster transactions.
The degens of the DeFi world who rushed to buy BALD thinking it was the next Shiba Inu or the next Pepe found themselves victims of a rug pull.
This event serves as a lesson to understand that memecoin trading is an extremely risky business that can lead to huge losses of one’s capital.
Immediately after rug pulling the liquidity, the BALD deployer published a post on the cryptocurrency’s official Twitter profile where he made it clear that what he had done was totally legitimate.
Since the token is controlled by the deployer’s address, and since the deployer is the main provider of liquidity, he had every right to remove what he had previously entered and do with the ‘earned’ assets as he wished.
While this clearly remains feasible, nothing detracts from the fact that the sale of BALD is framed as an attempt to defraud investors through securities, as well as a dishonest method of enriching oneself.
I always recommend traders do their own research and do not be fooled by supposed memecoins of the future.
The future is only Bitcoin and Ethereum, with perhaps a few minor exceptions
A viral post by a trader who turned $500 to hundreds of thousands sent Bald up by 4,000,000% in a matter of days, attracting over $66 million in Ether into the ecosystem as traders hoped to get returns from an otherwise flat and broader market.
Bald seemed to have it all: seemingly endless liquidity, a growing community, an influx of new traders and, in some circles, little hope that it would become the next Shiba Inu (SHIB). However, this euphoria lasted little more than a few days.
Bald prices fell as much as 90% from their peak after the token deployer removed millions of dollars of liquidity, causing sentiment to worsen rapidly as traders rushed for the exits amid uncertainty.
The deployer had previously contributed up to $35 million worth of Ether to a liquidity pool on Leetswap, an exchange built on the Base network, which created the illusion that it was a well-funded project.
They probably also earned millions of dollars in commissions by providing Ether against Bald tokens, as well as selling Ether against Bald when prices rose.
As such, the developer seemed unperturbed after the price drop.
“Tokens controlled by the deployer address, including liquidity tokens, are the property of the deployer who reserves the right to do anything with them.”Â
they said in a tweet.
“If you still decide to trade this token, you will probably lose all your money (if you somehow haven’t already). This is a memecoin. There is no roadmap. The fundamental value of this token is $0. There is no BALD team,”
they added at the time.
Some investigators even linked Bald to the Alameda research firm owned by Sam Bankman-Fried based on portfolio activity and connections to Alameda projects.
However, the identity of the wealthy backer remains a mystery until Monday.
