An unknown crypto dealer has made some of the unlikely fortunes of the yr, turning a $68,700 wager into roughly $9.4 million by backing a token that originated from a social media hack.
On Oct. 3, blockchain analytics agency Lookonchain reported that the dealer purchased 63.07 million models of a Binance Good Chain token referred to as “4” on Oct. 1 for 68 BNB.
Inside two days, the worth of that stash had multiplied by over 135x, leaving the holder with an unrealized acquire of roughly $9.3 million. This exceptional revenue as soon as once more highlights the extremes of memecoin hypothesis.
Not like typical cryptocurrencies, these tokens usually lack underlying utility and commerce nearly totally on social sentiment. Their volatility makes them dangerous, but the potential for exponential features continues to attract new traders.
4 memecoin origin story
The “4” memecoin token has an uncommon backstory. On Oct. 1, attackers hijacked the official BNB Chain X account and used it to distribute phishing hyperlinks.
BNB Chain later reported that ten malicious hyperlinks had been shared through the breach, leading to roughly $8,000 in complete losses throughout networks, with one person incurring a lack of as much as $6,500.
Yu Xiang, founding father of blockchain safety agency Slowmist, related the assault to Inferno Drainer. He mentioned:
“[This is] one other phishing operation associated to the infamous Inferno Drainer phishing group. Judging by one of many phishing pockets addresses, the variety of victims is likely to be a couple of dozen
Inferno Drainer is a infamous group recognized for providing “drainer-as-a-service” kits. These instruments allow scammers to create pretend web sites and accounts which might be designed to siphon funds in alternate for a share of the stolen belongings.
In the meantime, the attackers had additionally launched the “4” memecoin through the exploit, promoting their preliminary holdings for round $4,000. They then manipulated the market to push up costs and staged one other exit for $22,000 earlier than abandoning the undertaking.
In lots of circumstances, this is able to have been the tip of the story. Nevertheless, as a substitute of collapsing, the token discovered new life. Crypto merchants consolidated liquidity, successfully taking the undertaking out of the attacker’s arms and remodeling it right into a community-led asset.
That surprising shift fueled a value surge. Market tracker Dexscreener reveals that “4” gained practically 200% within the final 24 hours, buying and selling at $0.1775 with a market capitalization above $150 million as of press time.
