The team behind the meme coin URF vanished with 2400 SOL (~$450,000) collected during the token’s presale, as reported by on-chain researcher ZachXBT.
Influencer @BryceHall made multiple posts promoting a sketchy Solana presale for a meme coin called URF helping them raise ~2400 SOL ($450k).
The team disappeared less than 24 hrs after launch and social media accounts have had zero activity since March 26.
The URF team… pic.twitter.com/0onzoQudBt
— ZachXBT (@zachxbt) April 2, 2024
The developers executed a rug pull less than 24 hours after URF’s launch. The project’s last social media activity was on March 26.
The funds raised during the asset sale were also used by the team to trade other meme tokens on Solana.
ZachXBT noted that influencer Bryce Hall supported the project with several posts.
Following the incident, the media personality and bare-knuckle boxer with 1.3 million followers on X stated:
“Stop offering me to promote your shitcoins, I’ve graduated from that lifestyle.”
stop dming me to promote shit coins, i’ve graduated from that life style
— Bryce Hall (@BryceHall) April 2, 2024
Earlier, ZachXBT calculated that from March 12 to 20, 33 token presales on Solana raised nearly $140 million. Among them, the analyst highlighted several fraudulent cases with total losses of approximately $4.4 million, acknowledging that this is far from a complete list.
Some industry experts have criticized the meme coin boom, fearing a bubble burst. CryptoQuant’s founder and CEO Ki Young Ju stated that such projects harm the crypto industry. He compared the situation to the 2018 ICO mania, which resulted in most investors losing their funds.
Conversely, Messari’s head of research, Martje Baas, considered that meme tokens play an important role in attracting new users to cryptocurrencies. Former BitMEX CEO Arthur Hayes and macro investor Raoul Pal also saw benefits in these assets for the industry.
Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has urged not to be biased against this type of asset. In his view, meme coins should be endowed with new qualities of utility.