Major cryptocurrency exchanges Binance and Bitget have initiated investigations into the trading activity surrounding RaveDAO's RAVE token. This move follows allegations by on-chain analyst ZachXBT that insiders manipulated the market, leading to a substantial short squeeze that drove the token's price up rapidly.
Bitget's CEO, Gracy Chen, confirmed the exchange's investigation, while Binance's CEO, Richard Teng, stated that the platform is examining the claims and will always investigate signs of market misconduct. ZachXBT has offered a $10,000 bounty for whistleblowers to come forward with evidence about the parties involved. The project, which describes itself as a Web3 platform focused on electronic music events with blockchain-based ticketing and community governance, saw its token surge 4,500% over a week, resulting in over $44 million in RAVE positions being liquidated in a single day. Nearly 90% of the token's supply was concentrated in three Gnosis Safe wallets, and millions of tokens were transferred to exchanges before the price surge.
RaveDAO has stated that it is not responsible for the recent price action and plans to explore models that tie team incentives to ecosystem growth, but has not addressed specific on-chain allegations.