The announcement comes days after the Blur team said it would also shut down Blast, its Ethereum layer-2 blockchain, because it cost more to run than it earned.
Blur NFT marketplace to shut down
Blur, the NFT marketplace that overtook OpenSea in trading volume shortly after its 2022 launch, announced it will shut down its website in a month. They also announced that Blend, Blur's NFT lending platform, will stop matching new loans on the same day. Borrowers have until then to repay their loans or let them default.
At least $86 million stolen via tampered Ledger hardware wallets resold by CryptoBilis
The users of more than 300 Ledger cryptocurrency wallets have suffered an estimated $86 million to $93 million in losses after thieves drained assets across blockchains including bitcoin, Ethereum, and Tron. Ledger is a popular manufacturer of hardware wallets — a type of physical, offline device used to store cryptocurrency keys in an attempt to be more secure than storing keys on Internet-connected devices.
Ledger has claimed that the targeted wallets appear to have been sold via CryptoBilis, a Southeast Asian reseller that operates in Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines. Ledger said that at least one affected device "contained an unauthorized hardware implant". Several third party researchers disassembled affected hardware devices, finding that a chip and antenna had been added to capture crypto wallet seed phrases and transmit the data to the attacker using a cellular connection.
Pudgy Penguins company shuts down its Abstract blockchain after losing "8 figures" running it
Igloo, the company behind the Pudgy Penguins NFTs, announced it will shut down Abstract, its Ethereum layer-2 blockchain, on December 15. CEO Luca Netz said the company had lost "8 figures" in the less than two years they were running the chain.
Users have until December 15 to move their assets, after which anything left on the chain will become inaccessible. DefiLllama estimates there were around $76 million in assets on the chain when the shutdown was announced, leading some users to complain that the wind-down period is too short.
The shutdown comes a few months after Igloo shut down its Pudgy Party mobile game, which had dropped to around 200–300 active users shortly after its launch, and also lost the company millions of dollars.
Blur shuts down its Blast blockchain
Blast, the Ethereum layer-2 created by the team behind the Blur NFT marketplace, is shutting down less than three years after launch. In the announcement, they disclosed that its costs now exceed its revenue and that it sees "no credible path" to fixing that. Despite once boasting of more than $2 billion in total value locked in June 2024, generating revenue from network usage of around $3.5 million, that revenue has collapsed to less than $2,000 last month.
Porsche shuts down its NFT project with the floor price down 96%
When Porsche announced its Porsche 911 NFT project at Art Basel Miami in 2022, it promised holders "he opportunity to co-create Porsche's future in the Web3 universe". Turns out there wasn't much to that future.
After bungling the mint, selling fewer than 2,000 of the planned 7,500 NFTs after buyers balked at the 0.911 ETH (then $1,490) pricetag, the price went nearly exclusively downhill. Now, with the NFTs floundering with floor prices down 96% from launch, Porsche has announced it is ending its "shared adventure".
Near Intents exploited for $3.8 million, recovers all assets
Near Intents, a cross-chain swap service, halted operations after an attacker drained around $3.8 million by exploiting a bug in its Omni layer.
The next day, Near Intents posted addresses for returning the funds and threatened the attacker: "We have identified you, sir." The attacker returned everything the next day, in a transaction that included an on-chain message saying "We've returned all the funds, we were in the wrong". Near Intents confirmed the funds were returned, and said they were stopping their investigation.