Charges of deception hang over ZKasino, a decentralized online casino sold as built on zkSync and EigenLayer. The project is accused of deceiving its investors, who had invested several tens of millions of dollars in the form of Ether. What happened?
Rug pull underway on decentralized casino ZKasino?
Over the past few days, many people have voiced their dissatisfaction with ZKasino, a decentralized online casino presented as being based on zkSync and EigenLayer. According to them, the platform, which has just launched its mainnet, has changed certain information on its site concerning the way in which investors in the project would be reimbursed.
In short, in anticipation of the launch of the “ZKasino Chain”, the project would have encouraged interested parties to bridge their Ethers in order to receive ZKAS tokens (ZKasino’s so-called gas token), which were advertised as being available once the network was launched.
However, on the ZKasino website, it was explicitly stated that these ETH would be returned to their original holders once the ZKasino Chain was up and running. And it is precisely this part of the site that has been removed, meaning that investors will not see their Ethers again, contrary to what they were promised.
Screenshot of the ZKasino site dated April 4. The part framed in red has recently been removed
Zkasino does not deny this point. In a blog post dated Saturday April 20 announcing the launch of the Zkasino Chain, the project team clearly explains that the ETH invested have all been converted into ZKAS, the network’s gas token, “at a reduced rate of $0.055”. The press release explains that this is a “favor” granted to users, who were not consulted about this change.
Several suspicious elements surrounding the project
Actions that led to strong waves of criticism about the project. On ZKasino’s Telegram channel, where it is no longer possible to send messages, questions about the possible return of ETHs to their owners remain unanswered.
In the meantime, platforms such as MEXC, Ape Terminal and AIT Protocol have cancelled their Initial Dex Offering (IDO) planned for the launch of the ZKAS token.
According to internal conversations revealed by defizard (@belizardd), the individuals at the head of the project don’t seem in the least perturbed by the reactions of their community. Messages such as “They need to calm down lol”, “Yeah but plans change”, “We keep building”, “People always FUD, it’s normal”, or “We didn’t scam anything”, are exchanged.
ZachXBT, the on-chain investigator renowned for shedding light on scams taking place in the crypto ecosystem, said he wasn’t surprised by this last-minute change.
Everyone sent a known team of grifters $30M and expected it would go any different.
Stop tagging me why would you expect me to make a post when you did not listen to my warnings about this team last year. https://t.co/0JlWbJDn2V
– ZachXBT (@zachxbt) April 20, 2024
“Everyone sent $30 million to a known team of crooks and expected it to be different. Stop tagging me, why would you want me to make a post when you didn’t listen to my warnings about this team last year. “
Effectively, in December 2023, ZachXBT claimed that Derivatives Monke (@Derivatives_Ape), the individual at the helm of Zkasino and Syncus DAO, was untrustworthy. In particular, he allegedly refused to pay people who had promoted his projects, and he has factually never yet determined a winner for a $200,000 contest held in October 2023 for ZKasino.
According to cygaar (@0xCygaar), ZKasino’s famous blockchain, touted as combining the technologies of zkSync and EigenLayer, is actually a banal network deployed via Arbitrum Nitro. “It’s an Arbitrum Nitro chain that took 2 minutes to deploy. They made no effort to rip everyone off, lmao.”
It’s hard to predict what will happen to the project, such is the wave of discontent. ZKasino’s valuation is estimated at $350 million, according to their latest fundraising round of $26.2 million on March 19.
