Rug Pull Roundup: Week of August 20, 2023

Large-scale rug pulls have become commonplace in 2023. Instead of individually describing each scam, we’ll now do a roundup summarizing the major rug pulls that occurred during the week.

Inside the Rug Pulls

During the week of August 20th, there were two major rug pulls with over $1 million stolen from users:

• LayerZero Token: The deployer of a fake LayerZero token hosted on BSC drained value from the protocol this week. Approximately 4,828 WBNB tokens were taken out, totaling approximately $1 million in losses.
  

• Magnate Finance: Magnate Finance, hosted on Base, performed a rug pull of over $6.4 million in tokens as well as deleting its website and social media. The deployer address for the contract is also linked to several past rug pulls, including Solfire and Kokomo Finance.

Staying Safe From Crypto Rug Pulls

Rug pulls are exits by scam projects designed to pump up the value of a token or project and then drain its value. Often — as in the case of Magnate Finance — there are warning signs before the attack occurs. Always do your own research before investing and check out our post on the warning signs of a rug pull.