Just as the entire crypto market was booming with new ATHs for Bitcoin (BTC), GIGA tokens crashed by 50%. The meme, which was one of the top cults promoted by influencers, fell after large-scale selling from two wallets.
GIGA tokens crashed after a whale wallet sold off its funds. As a cult token, GIGA relied on irrational holding, especially from influencers. The reason for the crash, however, was a hacker with no skin in the game managing to drain a high-profile wallet. Still, meme tokens still have to deal with the perpetual threats of insider selling or early buyers cashing in profits.
The tokens that led to the crash came from the wallet of Still In The Game, an influencer dedicated specifically to this cult. Soon after the sale, GIGA recovered to $0.04, from its usual range of $0.06. The shakedown led the token as low as $0.009 and prevented it from rallying further. The scammer accepted significant slippage to move the funds, liquidating tokens valued at $6.09M at only $2.1M in realized gains.
Part of the SOL was sold for stablecoins and stored in an idle address, while another portion ended up on KuCoin. The exchange may be one clue to the hacker’s real identity, though some traders may use fake profiles.
In the immediate aftermath, the GIGA community intervened to relaunch the token’s market cap from $90M to $550M. It is now back to trading within a range, erasing what looked like a rug pull.
Initially, observers thought the GIGA sale was the work of an insider, which counteracted the logic of holding the token as part of the community.
GIGA is one of the assets promoted by Murad Mahmudov, right next to SPX6900 (SPX). This does not guarantee price performance, but this fame has made the token a hot target for exploiters.
GIGA falls prey to Zoom exploit
Initially, followers of Still In The Game suspected the decision to sell was intentional since all holdings were consolidated into the same wallet. However, the influencer claimed the transactions were approved by malware.
ScamSniffer noted this kind of exploit is common in crypto. The scam involves reaching out to influencers with a faked Zoom package. The malware is reportedly capable of directly targeting wallets and sending out transactions.
🚨 WARNING: Beware of fake Zoom malware!
A $GIGA holder lost millions!Compare carefully:
us04-zoom[.]us ❌
us02web.zoom[.]us ✅They look similar, right? That's the trap! 🎯 pic.twitter.com/RWMur5MM7V
— Scam Sniffer | Web3 Anti-Scam (@realScamSniffer) November 12, 2024
The Zoom scam has been around for the past few months as noted by scam trackers. The approach usually targets influencers or founders for a legitimate-sounding reason before requiring a flawed download.
The Zoom-mimicking malware targets browsers, cookies, and wallet files, affecting some of the widely used wallets. The malicious download link impersonating a Zoom URL can gather passwords and even expose the private keys of wallets stored on a device.
The best way to avoid these attacks is to recognize and avoid these malicious links or to use a hardware wallet that does not expose private keys. Similar malicious link phishing scams targeting wallets have stolen more than $314M in the past few months.
GIGA recovers after the sell-off
In the case of GIGA, the malware reportedly consolidated three wallets into one and then sold GIGA on Raydium. The token still holds $6.2M in liquidity after the 85% drawdown. GIGA slipped within a minute, meaning the loss was not due to ongoing selling pressure.
The selling, however, came as a surprise, as meme token holders continue to see whales cashing out at the peak. In the case of SPX or GIGA, buying may continue near the top price range, at the risk of absorbing losses. Drawdowns of 70% are not unusual, even for cult tokens, and have happened for WIF and POPCAT before rapid recoveries.
GIGA is attempting to become a prime cult meme token. The entire space rallied after BTC broke the record at $90,000 per coin. The total valuation of all meme tokens is now over $111B. However, Murad Mahmudov has a target price for GIGA at $50B, potentially surpassing blue chip memes.
