Monad, an Ethereum rival, offered early investors up to $60 million to cash out. Almost all said no
The program came three months before investor unlocks begin, with MON trading below its public-sale price and most of the token supply still outside circulation.
Monad, a blockchain network competing with Ethereum, extended an offer to early investors to sell their locked tokens for a discounted price. However, nearly all of those approached declined the opportunity. The Monad Foundation announced on Tuesday that it had completed a program offering to buy locked MON tokens from certain early investors at a reduced price, setting aside up to $60 million for these purchases.
The exact discount rate, the final amount spent, or the number of investors who participated were not disclosed by the Foundation. The program essentially provided an early exit for those willing to accept a lower price, allowing them to receive cash before their MON tokens became tradeable. The locked tokens, amounting to approximately 19.7 billion of the original supply, were meant to remain locked according to their original schedule, with no impact on the overall market liquidity.
Monad's MON token is utilized for transaction fees and securing the network. These tokens began to unlock after a one-year waiting period, with monthly releases over the course of a four-year schedule. As such, investors could typically start selling their tokens in November. Currently, MON is trading around $0.021, which is about 16% below the $0.025 price from the public sale last year.
The token's market value is near $250 million, considering a fully diluted value of about $2.1 billion. Despite the network's growing activity, with the amount deposited in Monad-based decentralized finance apps reaching approximately $895 million, which is a 150% increase in six weeks, investors still chose not to accept the Foundation's offer.
The reasons behind this decision remain unclear, but it is unlikely to be simply a bullish sentiment towards MON. The Foundation stated that the program aimed to provide liquidity to early investors whose circumstances or investment plans had changed while maintaining the interest of the remaining holders for the long term.
Written by urgent.news from CoinDesk's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
