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Just last week, Mantra’s OM token looked great: up over 800% year‑on‑year, a fresh $108 million ecosystem fund and a $1 billion Dubai real‑estate deal

In the swirling dust of Sunday’s crypto collapse, one token’s implosion stood out: Mantra’s OM token. Just last week, it looked like a star performer, boasting year‑on‑year gains of over 800%, a fresh $108 million ecosystem fund and a $1 billion Dubai real‑estate deal (Mantra is a blockchain for tokenizing physical assets like buildings and art) in the pipeline.

But then, over the course of Sunday, its price cratered more than 90% from around $6.3 to below $0.5, erasing over $5.4 billion in value and sending traders hunting for villains. A snapshot of the token’s price over the past year shows the magnitude of the decline.

The price began plummeting visibly on Sunday after several reports surfaced. One report by blockchain analysts at Chainalysis flagged 17 wallets moving 43.6 million OM (about $227 million) to exchanges Binance and OKX in the days leading up to the crash. Another report by crypto news outlet TokenPost claimed that a high-profile investor, Nomura-backed Laser Digital, was selling its entire OM holdings after an analytics platform apparently mistagged its wallets. However, Laser Digital quickly took to X, formerly known as Twitter, to deny involvement in the sell-off.

Rumors of over-the-counter (OTC) fire‑sales at half price also circulated, adding fuel to the panic. As the selling commenced, liquidity quickly dried up. Traditionally thin Sunday order books couldn’t handle the sudden influx of sell orders, which in turn triggered leveraged positions to be liquidated.

By the time the cascade of events came to a halt, veteran traders were drawing comparisons to the aftermath of Terra’s LUNA collapse. In a statement to Bloomberg, CEO John Patrick Mullin denied any insider sales, placing blame on “reckless forced closures” by centralized exchanges and promising a token buyback.

Exchange OKX, which saw the majority of the OM tokens land on its platform, pointed to MANTRA’s suspicious token economic changes and concentrated ownership. A portion of the 17 wallets that moved a large amount of OM tokens belonged to a crypto hedge fund, which was reportedly forced to sell its entire position in OM after another token in its portfolio went bad.

Despite the rapid depreciation of OM, Mullin expressed optimism for the future of the project. In an interview with Blockworks, he highlighted the potential of a new ecosystem fund to support developers building on Mantra’s blockchain.

“We’re going to come back stronger from this. We’re going to use this opportunity to rebuild and innovate,” Mullin said.

The crater BlockFi, Celsius & Co. left in crypto credit hasn’t stayed empty. In centralized crypto lending, the throne now belongs to Tether, Galaxy Digital and Ledn—a trio that controls nearly 90 % of what remains of centralized lending. The bigger shift, however, is on-chain: DeFi protocols now originate just over half of all crypto loans ($19.1 billion of the market’s $36.5 billion total), turning smart contracts into the sector’s chief credit officers.

After a year-long crackdown by U.S. regulators, the dust is settling on the crypto industry. A snapshot of the scene:

* After months of speculation, the administration scrapped the capital rules that would have limited how much crypto firms could hold in a given bank. The move came after a lobbying blitz by industry groups, and it’s a major victory for the industry.

* In April, Congress passed a bill that would largely eliminate the need for crypto exchanges to provide burdensome paperwork to the Internal Revenue Service for users to calculate capital gains taxes. The move is a win for crypto users, who have long complained about the complexity of the tax reporting requirements.

* The Department of Justice has shut down its crypto task force and will instead focus its efforts on pursuing crypto scammers. The move comes as several high-profile crypto executives have faced SEC fraud charges.

Beyond holding a variety of crypto tokens in a strategic reserve and putting an unsermonious end to the administration’s prosecution of industry players, the administration is also making bipartisan efforts to craft rules for dollar-pegged stablecoins.

The administration’s focus on crypto has helped to stabilize the industry and promote innovation. A bet that's paying off : bitcoin is up almost 30% since election night, and broader crypto prices have remained afloat despite some chop on Wall Street.

News data source: kdj.com

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