The mysterious developer behind BALD, one of the most viral tokens in recent months, yesterday transferred some $12 million in Ether (ETH) back to the Ethereum network, said data cited by analytics firm Lookonchain. This marked the first time more money was sent out of the Base network than bridged in, a Dune Analytics query showed.
The sudden rise of BALD in early August came when Base, a blockchain built by crypto exchange Coinbase, wasn’t even officially open to the public. A viral post of a trader turning $500 to hundreds of thousands sent BALD zoomed 4,000,000% within days, attracting over $66 million in Ether to the ecosystem.
However, the euphoria lasted little beyond a few days. BALD prices fell as much as 90% after peaking when the token’s deployer removed millions of dollars worth of liquidity – causing traders to rush for the exits amid the uncertainty.
The deployer had previously added up to $35 million worth of Ether to a liquidity pool on Leetswap, an exchange built on Base network, which created the illusion of it being a well-funded project. They also possibly made millions of dollars in fees from supplying Ether against BALD tokens, as well as from selling Ether for BALD when prices rose.
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, the deployer said in a tweet.
The wealthy deployer’s identity remains a mystery as of Monday.