2025 Web3 Bizarre Events Revelation: True Stories More Incredible Than Fiction

Editor’s note: This is not fictional burnout but a real top ten list of bizarre events in the blockchain world. Each incident makes us rethink: in the collision between the dream of decentralization and the reality of vested interests, what will human nature lead to?

The “Ghost” Behind Political Figures: Over 100 Million Dollars of Invisible Army

Event Summary

Early 2025, political figures began appearing on the crypto stage. The new US leader launched TRUMP tokens, followed by their spouse Melania launching MELANIA tokens. In mid-February, a South American leader joined the feast, launching LIBRA tokens.

On the surface, this seems like political recognition of Web3. But the problem arose: just hours after LIBRA tokens were issued, the issuer withdrew $87 million USDC and SOL tokens from the liquidity pool, causing the token price to plummet over 80% in a short time. This is clearly a classic “carpet withdrawal” operation.

Community investigations revealed a more complex picture. Blockchain analysis tracked strong links between MELANIA and LIBRA smart contract deployment addresses, both involved in a project ecosystem with multiple “exit scam” incidents. Reportedly, the market maker for LIBRA was publicly accused by several crypto KOLs of being a “family crime syndicate.”

Even more outrageous, investigators found a “mole” clue: an advisor close to a certain government official received a $5 million bribe, which facilitated this token promotion. In other words, spending $5 million to earn over 100 times return—this deal was extremely lucrative for the behind-the-scenes manipulators.

Why to Pay Attention

The absurdity of this incident lies in: when capital colludes with power, a daylight robbery unfolds. Who can still be trusted? The answer might only be the private keys in your wallet.

Absurdity Index: ★★★★★

The Gambler Life of Millionaire Employees: From Trust to Backstabbing

Event Summary

Late February, a digital bank issuing stablecoins was hacked, with $49.5 million transferred out. After the incident, the project founder quickly publicly admitted and promised full compensation even in the worst case, earning community goodwill.

The plot twist that followed was unexpected: it was not a hack at all, but an internal employee’s deliberate theft.

The accused employee, Shen Shanxuan, is a senior developer of the project, holding the highest permissions over the company’s fund management smart contract. Logically, after completing development, he should have handed over permissions to the project team, but he secretly retained control. When the time was ripe, he directly withdrew $49.5 million from the vault.

The most dramatic part: why would a staff member earning millions risk so much? The answer is—gambling addiction. Despite his high income, Shen Shanxuan couldn’t control his obsession with derivatives trading, borrowing repeatedly to leverage, accumulating debts beyond repayment. This tech elite ultimately became a “desperate gambler.”

Why to Pay Attention

In the shift from “sharing knowledge” to “building real industry,” Web3 entrepreneurs still have a lot to learn. The most important lesson: even the best tech geniuses should stay away from derivatives.

Absurdity Index: ★

Whales Rewrite History with Chips in Hand

Event Summary

Late March, on a popular prediction market, the odds suddenly reversed on whether “Ukraine will accept a certain agreement before April.” The originally near-zero “Yes” option skyrocketed to 100% overnight. This was not due to a sudden change in circumstances but because a whale used 5 million governance tokens to vote, forcibly changing the result.

The mechanism of this prediction market is: anyone can propose a question and stake collateral; others can challenge with equal collateral; finally, all token holders in the community vote on the final answer. In theory, this is a democratized “truth mechanism.”

But the problem is: if you hold enough tokens, you can force the “truth.” That’s what this whale did—using majority voting power to overpower opponents, even if they knew the answer was wrong, they had no choice but to compromise due to the huge disparity in strength.

The platform later admitted to this manipulation but refused to correct it, citing “it’s part of the rules.” By August, the platform introduced improvements, but these were superficial and did not change the oracle’s inherent centralization.

Why to Pay Attention

A so-called “decentralized truth oracle” being easily manipulated by whales—is this a product design failure or a mockery of the “decentralization” concept?

Absurdity Index: ★★★

$456 Million Disappearance: Mistake, Negligence, or Deliberate?

Event Summary

Early April, a famous crypto entrepreneur held a launch event in Hong Kong, accusing a trust company of illegally transferring $456 million in reserves. However, the Hong Kong court dismissed the lawsuit. A month earlier, another Dubai court had frozen the funds, suspecting breach of trust.

What is the truth? Let’s clear the fog:

Background: A stablecoin project operated jointly by two companies. One handles technology and operations; the other (based in California) manages reserves and banking relations, choosing a trust company as custodian. The entrepreneur appears as a market advisor but is described in court documents as the “actual controller.” The key question: is he truly the legal decision-maker?

Entrepreneur’s claim: Since 2021, the company managing reserves colluded with multiple trust institutions, secretly establishing fund exit channels. Under false documents and instructions, $456 million was transferred to a Dubai-based company, whose real owner is linked to a certain fund. The entrepreneur claims he was unaware of all this.

Trust company’s statement: The trust company states they received transfer instructions from an “authorized representative” claiming to act on behalf of the entrepreneur. Due to doubts about the source, they transferred the funds to another related company, which was supposed to generate profits. They insist they did not steal anything—if the true controller verifies identity and requests, they can return the funds. But who is the “real controller”?

Plot twist: During an online hearing, a participant with the username “Bob” appeared. The judge asked him to turn on his camera, and it turned out this “Bob” was the entrepreneur himself. Why not participate openly? This raised suspicion: perhaps he has some secrets he doesn’t want to reveal publicly.

Why to Pay Attention

Sometimes, being too clever backfires. If someone desperately hides their true identity to control funds, how do we judge whether they are victims or potential scammers?

Absurdity Index: ★★★★

The 22-Year-Old Genius’s “Digital Inheritance”: Dead or Fake Death?

Event Summary

Early May, the co-founder of a hot crypto project, only 22 years old, Jeff, held a mysterious live stream. Soon, a shocking rumor spread online: he committed suicide during the stream. The video went viral on Twitter, and the crypto community mourned.

But the story is not so simple. Shortly before his “suicide,” he published an article about “inheritance coins,” proposing a bold idea: developers promise to buy but never sell a certain token; after their death, these tokens will be permanently locked on the blockchain as a “digital monument.” Coincidentally, on the same day, a token called LLJEFFY launched on a platform.

On May 5, a platform called “Legacy” published an obituary, generally believed to be in memory of the young founder. The next day, his personal blog automatically posted an article—opening with the classic preset phrase: “If you are reading this, I am already gone…”

But the real twist came when two well-known crypto influencers leaked a letter in which the founder explained his plan. He claimed to be a victim of harassment, scams, and extortion. Stalking by former partners, extortion by others, and his personal info being publicly exposed made him feel threatened. He wanted to disappear but was afraid that announcing his exit would crash the project’s token price, causing losses for everyone. So he staged this “fake death.”

The final key clue: on-chain analysis found that a wallet linked to Jeff sold 35.55 million of his project tokens on May 7, receiving 8,572 SOL (~$127,000), then transferred 7,100 SOL (~$106,000) to the developer wallet of LLJEFFY.

So, the question: was he truly cornered and forced to leave, or was he cleverly doing a “safe cash-out”?

Why to Pay Attention

Betrayal and threats are never exclusive to the business world. When you enter a game without guarantees, you must understand it’s a life-and-death gamble, with luck playing a huge role.

Absurdity Index: ★★★

On-Chain Freezing: Salvation or Centralization?

Event Summary

Late May, a well-known DEX was attacked, with $223 million stolen. Surprisingly, just two hours later, the project announced it had frozen $162 million of the stolen funds.

How is that possible? How did they freeze funds without the attacker’s private keys? The answer: through the blockchain’s consensus mechanism. The chain requires 2/3 of nodes to agree to execute transactions. The project coordinated these nodes to collectively refuse to process transactions from the attacker’s address, effectively “freezing” those funds at the chain level.

Only about $60 million successfully moved to Ethereum; the rest remained locked on the original chain. As for recovering these funds, engineers proposed a special code execution: a forced transfer without attacker signatures. But ultimately, validators denied receiving such a request, and the code was never executed.

Why to Pay Attention

Discussing whether a chain is truly decentralized is now largely meaningless. The real question: if I accidentally send funds to the wrong address, will this chain help me recover? Maybe this “special case” deserves our deep thought.

Absurdity Index: ☆

The Transformation of a Pharmaceutical Company: From Fundraising to Web3

Event Summary

Early July, a listed pharmaceutical company in Hong Kong signed a memorandum of cooperation with a blockchain project. It seemed normal, but in fact, it was a carefully designed “reverse merger.”

What is a reverse merger? Usually, a company wanting to go public acquires an already listed shell company. But here, it’s reversed—the listed pharmaceutical company absorbed the blockchain project. And this is not the first such “coincidence”: as early as April, the company had appointed two founders of the blockchain project as executive directors.

Along with this “merger,” the listed company announced in August the issuance of 145 million new shares, raising HKD 58.82 million for blockchain development. In theory, riding the Web3 wave, the stock price should soar. It did spike briefly but then crashed sharply.

The turning point was mid-September—fundraising plans failed to meet conditions before the deadline, and the stock plunged. By the end of September, after renaming the company, the decline worsened. In mid-November, the exchange announced a suspension investigation, suspecting it no longer met listing requirements.

Why to Pay Attention

Even if a place claims to support Web3 development, such blatant “backdoor listing” behavior seems too crude, even suspecting everyone is a fool.

Absurdity Index: ★★★★

After Car Dreams Shattered, Entering Crypto Financing

Event Summary

Mid-August, a renowned serial entrepreneur announced entering crypto via his car company. The firm launched an “index product” tracking the top ten global crypto assets, and a corresponding “treasury product.” The slogan was to use 80% passive and 20% active management to ensure stable returns.

According to official plans, they aimed to raise $500 million to $1 billion for crypto investments, initially targeting $30 million to $1 billion worth of assets. They even invested $30 million in a healthcare company to help it transition into crypto, with the entrepreneur as an advisor.

Recently, he announced a partnership with a well-known automaker, promising their new cars will connect to the partner’s charging network, and expressed interest in autonomous driving tech cooperation.

Why to Pay Attention

This entrepreneur always finds new ways to accomplish “impossible” missions. Though not a perfect 5-star, that’s to leave some ranking room for the politicians ahead.

Absurdity Index: ★★★★☆

Stablecoin Project Self-Destructs

Event Summary

Early November, a stablecoin project encountered issues. It used a mechanism similar to USDe but aimed for higher yields by applying neutral risk strategies across various crypto assets. Sharp-eyed on-chain observers found that from late October, two suspicious addresses started receiving large amounts of the project’s tokens and loaned them via a lending protocol—borrowing at over 30% annual interest.

The absurd part: holders could redeem their original stablecoins in just one day, but these addresses chose to borrow at extremely high rates. Even more absurd, one address was directly linked to the project’s founder.

If the founder himself is rushing to cash out, what signal does that send to the market? Users quickly got the answer—the token plummeted in value. On November 8, the project issued a statement promising to compensate affected users, but that statement disappeared later.

Further investigation revealed the founder also started two other failed projects. One faced a payment crisis during the 2022 bear market and is still in “restructuring”; the other disappeared after protocol-level attacks.

Why to Pay Attention

The biggest lesson in history is that humans never learn from history. Failures in entrepreneurship often lead to second startups, but if risk management issues keep recurring, it’s not bad luck but a real problem.

Absurdity Index: ★★★

The “Risk-Free” Game of Venture Capital

Event Summary

Late November, a well-known investment fund’s deal with a Layer1 project contained a “special clause”: the $25 million invested had a one-year right to buy back at original price. In other words, if the project’s token underperformed, the fund could demand full repayment.

This is essentially a “riskless investment,” while other investors bear all risks.

The project co-founder initially denied the report’s accuracy but later said the clause was to hedge against the token failing to list on time. The key issue: other investors in the same round were unaware of this special arrangement.

Legal experts analyzed that concealing material investment info might violate disclosure rules under securities law. Further investigation showed the fund continued buying the project’s tokens amid market volatility, not “fleeing” as reported. But this does not hide the unfairness—some investors enjoy downside protection others cannot access.

Why to Pay Attention

If it’s truly such an arrangement, it has gone beyond risk investment, almost turning into a covert plunder of others. Do you still insist that Web3 doesn’t need strong regulation?

Absurdity Index: ★★★