The founder of a meme coin project called Slerf has sparked chaos in the crypto community after accidentally destroying 150,000 Solana SOL/USD tokens, valued at roughly $10 million.
What Happened: Detailing the events in a series of tweets on Monday, the founder said they initially attempted to burn the project's liquidity pool (LP) using Solana tools.
These tokens were slated for an airdrop, a promotional giveaway designed to attract interest in the project.
When that method failed, they switched to Sol incinerator, a platform designed to destroy unwanted tokens.
According to Slerf's tweets, while attempting to clear out "shitcoins" sent to the project's wallet, they mistakenly included the airdrop tokens in the burn transaction.
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Twitter Reacts With Shock and Humor
The crypto community reacted to the news with a mix of shock, amusement, and frustration.
"From what we have gathered, it does seem like a genuine mistake," crypto influencer Mario Nawfal told Benzinga.
"No one would, quite frankly, do that on purpose. We can’t currently see a way that the pre-sale participants get their money back without outside involvement from Founders or the community. The silver lining is people realized there would be minimum sell pressure, and the token is doing really well with an enviable amount of liquidity. At the current growth trajectory, the possibility of it listing on top exchanges in the near future wouldn't be unrealistic," he added, stressing that his comments should not be construed as financial advice.
Twitter users like Aldover and Abceater labeled the incident the "biggest rug in presale history," while others like zarkayus expressed disbelief at the sheer magnitude of the mistake.
Slerf's subsequent tweets attempted to remedy the situation.
They offered apologies and proposed a new pre-sale, promising to refund those who participated in the original pre-sale from the proceeds.
However, some users, like Crypto Adversiting remain skeptical.
What's Next: The future of the Slerf project remains unclear. Some users, like Yoshimitsu, found humor in the situation, suggesting the project change its description. However, others, like Nilez, used the incident as a cautionary tale against burning liquidity pools.
The possibility of legal repercussions was also raised, with users like GQGGameClub recommending Slerf contact law enforcement.
The blunder occurs at a time when the cryptocurrency community is debating whether this bull market is stalling or bound to continue soon.
Image created using artificial intelligence with Midjourney.
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