Some recent investigations suggest threatening news for the NFTs and cryptocurrencies scene connecting the deployer address for the BALL token to the Lil Hippie NFT project and Mr. Moe. This discovery has been made at a time when investors are complaining of being defrauded by the project’s developers in a rug pull scheme that saw $330,000 drained from the community fund.
Abandoned project ties
ZachXBT, a well-known on-chain analyst pointed out that the deployer address of BALL is linked to the inactive Lil Hippie NFT project that has not been active since June 2023.
The hyped project called Lil Hippo, associated with Mr Moe declared further appreciation of its utility and the Ball token through airdrops. However, since mid-2023, there have been no updates from the NFT team and this has brought cogent questions on the credibility of the NFT project and its objectives.
Rug pull accusations
ZachXBT investigations revealed that $330,000 was cashed out in a single transaction, which is typical of a rug pull, whereby the developers abandon a project after embezzling investors’ money.
Looking at the dump and particularly the nature of the dump where it was sudden and no effort was made to obscure the transaction, the crypto community has been furious.
Scottie Pippen’s involvement
Adding to that, the association between NBA legend, Scottie Pippen who has been involved in an NFT project known as Pip, and the BALL project has added to the controversy. By this time, Pippen had faced criticism for previous rug pulls in the crypto space, which made the BALL project seem less credible.
As some of the community members pointed out, Pippen’s project is intended to be a long-term enterprise with the constant support of the community, but the existence of abandoned projects leaves its shadow on these words.
As to the backlash, the team behind the BALL project admitted that there was a ‘hiccup’ at the start and currently it is battling scammers. They explained that more liquidity had been returned from the main wallet and kept stressing the fact they were here to support the community. But these have not helped to reduce the level of scepticism and disbelief that investors are beginning to portray.
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