Railgun

Base

April

Tornado Cash

Tornado

ETHTrustFund (ETF), a Base network protocol that advertised itself as similar to Olympus or Wonderland, transferred $2 million from its treasury to Tornado Cash and Railgun mixer apps on July 20 and deleted all of its websites and social media accounts. This caused security experts to conclude that the project was a “rug pull” or exit scam.&nbsp;
The incident was first <a href="https://x.com/0ctoshi/status/1815026461675335752" target="_blank" rel="noopener nofollow">reported</a> by crypto investor and X user Octoshi on July 21. According to Octoshi, the project’s treasury had been sent to a new address the previous day.
<figure>
 <img src="https://s3.cointelegraph.com/uploads/2024-07/68ed932c-f1c1-40e6-9318-5d15e939353b.png" alt="ETHTrustFund DAO transfers $2M treasury in apparent rug pull" title="">
 <figcaption style="text-align: center;">
 Source: <a href="https://x.com/0ctoshi/status/1815026461675335752" target="_blank" rel="noopener nofollow">Octoshi</a>
 </figcaption>
</figure>
On July 22, blockchain security platform PeckShield <a href="https://x.com/PeckShieldAlert/status/1815275372818428332" target="_blank" rel="noopener nofollow">shared</a> the report. According to the blockchain security firm, ETHTrustFund developers transferred the funds to mixer apps Tornado Cash and Railgun in an apparent attempt to launder them.
According to an archived version of the ETHTrustFund developer documents, the project was conceived as a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) with rebasing features, similar to Olympus, Wonderland or other similar projects. 
The fund issued blockchain-based bonds and sold them to investors in exchange for cryptocurrency. It also “rebased” or issued new ETF tokens to users who staked their tokens in the fund’s smart contracts.
Related: <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/court-appointed-insolvency-firm-takes-over-hectordao-after-2-7m-hack">Court-appointed insolvency firm takes over HectorDAO after $2.7M hack</a>
In addition, ETHTrustFund <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20240314172053/https://docs.ethtf.io/" target="_blank" rel="noopener nofollow">featured</a> a new twist on the classic rebaseDAO idea: instead of constantly rebasing to produce more tokens, the fund would purportedly slow its inflation after a period of time and begin to “debase” or destroy its own ETF tokens, pushing up the remaining tokens’ prices over time. Meanwhile, all of the assets invested into the fund would be used to generate yield for tokenholders.
However, the debasing period appears to have never been reached. According to Octoshi, ETHTrustFund lead developer Peng stopped responding to Telegram messages in April before finally rugging the project on July 20.
Rug pulls continue to be a frequent source of losses to crypto investors. In June, the Gemholic protocol was accused of conducting a $3.5 million exit scam after it allegedly promised refunds to investors before <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/gemholic-scam-suspected-rug-pull-zksync">transferring the funds to its own team</a> instead. 
In March, investors lost $1.4 million when admin accounts associated with the Ordiz bridge deleted their socials and <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/ordizk-bridge-vanishes-alleged-rug-pull-certik">transferred all remaining funds</a> to new accounts, leaving users unable to withdraw from the bridge.
<a href="https://cointelegraph.com/magazine/ethereum-ico-blockchain-forensics-double-spending-debate/">Magazine: Decade after Ethereum ICO: Blockchain forensics end double-spending debate</a>

ETHTrustFund DAO transfers $2M treasury in apparent rug pull

Cointelegraph

Other articles published on Jul 22, 2024

Bitwise Spot Ethereum ETF Gets Listing Approval from NYSE Arca!

Top Contenders: MogCoin, PEPE, or Rollblock – Who Will Lead Us to The Promised Land?

MOONHOP Sprints to $1M: Leaving Brett and Bitcoin in the Bear Dust With 4900% Prediction on Launch

XRP and KANG on an A Rise Amid Market Downturn, Will They Explode in July 2024?

OKX Wallet Integrates with Umami Finance to Enhance DeFi Accessibility

Prominent Analyst Claims “If This Level is Exceeded in BTC, Parabolic Uptrend May Come”, Issues a...

Join our free newsletter for daily crypto updates!