On April 13, the price of the Mantra (OM) token took a nosedive from $6.30 to a paltry $0.50, shedding over 90% of its value in a single day. This catastrophic event vaporized more than $6 billion from Mantra’s market cap, leaving the crypto community in a state of collective jaw-droppery.
Many are convinced this wasn’t just a case of the market having a bad hair day. Instead, whispers of a meticulously planned “pump-and-dump” scheme involving market makers and centralized exchanges (CEXs) are doing the rounds. 🕵️♂️
Are Market Makers and CEXs in Cahoots to Fleece Investors?
According to the ever-insightful Anon Vee, the Mantra debacle is a classic case of pump-and-dump shenanigans. He explained that market makers have a penchant for targeting obscure tokens, teaming up with projects to artificially inflate the price, and then dumping the tokens faster than a hot potato at a picnic.
He drew parallels between Mantra and Tellor (TRB), which skyrocketed from $6 to $629 during 2022–2023 before crashing back to earth. Similarly, Mantra soared from $0.013 to $9, pushing its fully diluted valuation (FDV) from $20 million to $11 billion before plummeting to around $0.4978. 📉
“Do you really believe the Mantra pump and dump wasn’t planned?… It works best when the insiders control most of the supply,” Anon Vee quipped.
Crypto influencer Leonidas echoed this sentiment, pointing an accusatory finger at centralized exchanges like Binance.
According to him, Binance played a pivotal role in promoting OM, creating a hype train that lured in retail investors. But once the price peaked, market makers and CEXs allegedly dumped their tokens, causing the crash and leaving retail investors holding the bag. 🚂💨
“CEXs (like Binance who promoted it in 11 posts) teamed up with market makers to pump the price up, lure in retail, then they dump on your face. That is the only truth,” Leonidas declared.
One unfortunate investor revealed that they had poured $3.5 million into the RWA OM token, only to see their investment dwindle to a mere $200,000—a staggering drop of over 90%. 💸
Arthur, founder and CIO of DeFiance Capital, also voiced concerns about liquidity issues in the crypto market. He warned that project teams and market makers often collude to maintain artificially high prices over extended periods, deceiving investors in the process.
He stressed that this practice distorts a token’s real value and poses serious risks to the entire market. Arthur called for more transparency and stricter oversight to protect investors. 🛡️
“The biggest problem plaguing the liquid crypto market now is the complete black box of how projects and market makers can work together to create an artificial price that can sustain for a very long period… If the big players in the industry don’t step up to improve this, a large part of the market will remain uninvestable for the foreseeable future,” Arthur cautioned.
Investors React Differently to Mantra’s Explanation
John Mullin, co-founder of Mantra, publicly denied the insider trading allegations. He claimed the collapse resulted from “forced closures” by certain centralized exchanges. According to him, the incident occurred during a low-liquidity period—specifically on a Sunday night—which exacerbated the situation. 🌙
Mullin hinted that one specific exchange was primarily responsible, but he insisted it wasn’t Binance.
Despite his explanation, the community remained skeptical, questioning whether this was merely a smokescreen to obscure deeper issues within the project. Regardless of Mantra’s statement, many investors believed that a crash of this magnitude could only be orchestrated by a market maker. 🎭
“In this case, someone big decided that they wanted out and did not care that the price will be impacted. This crash is either a market maker going rogue or some insider deciding he wants out and sold beyond available liquidity. When this happens, the market maker will also pull out his liquidity since nobody wants to burn more money,” Investor Duo Nine explained.
At the time of writing, OM is trading around $0.60—down more than 90% from $6 just two days ago.
Nevertheless, some investors saw the crash as an opportunity. For example, Carl Moon, Founder of Moon Capital, decided to buy $100,000 worth of Mantra (OM) after the price drop. 🌕
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2025-04-15 12:56