Aquabot Rug Pull: $4.65M in Solana Stolen Before Token Launch

TLDR

• Aquabot allegedly stole $4.65M from presale investors by moving SOL funds to exchanges.
• The theft involved a compromised wallet linked to the project’s staking partner.
• Several influencers promoted Aquabot, raising concerns about presale scams in Solana.
• SwissBorg warns of increasing presale risks after the Aquabot controversy.

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Aquabot, a Solana-based Telegram trading bot project, has been flagged for a likely rug pull, with over $4.65 million in Solana (SOL) stolen from its presale investors. The funds, totaling 21.77K SOL, were transferred through multiple wallets and sent to instant exchanges. The alleged theft took place just before Aquabot’s planned token generation event (TGE), leaving many investors without the promised tokens.

ZachXBT, an on-chain investigator, first identified the suspicious activity, tracking the movement of funds from the presale wallet into intermediary addresses. These funds were split into four separate tranches, a common tactic to obscure transaction trails and avoid detection. Following the transfers, Aquabot disabled replies on all of its social media posts, heightening concerns among the crypto community about potential fraud.

Suspicious Nature of the Aquabot Presale

Aquabot marketed itself as a low-fee Telegram trading bot offering a novel “liquidity ladder” presale design, which staggered entry prices for buyers. This model was pitched as a solution to prevent “inorganic” trading patterns often seen in traditional presales. However, just before the TGE, the team altered the terms, imposing vesting on presale buyers, which raised immediate red flags among the community.

Investors had been promised 100% token distribution at launch without vesting, but the sudden change in terms and the subsequent disappearance of the funds suggest that the project may have been set up to deceive participants from the start.

The presale, which was promoted by several influencers and teams including Meteora, Quill Audits, Helius, and Dialect, initially created excitement in the community, but this incident has now cast doubt on the reliability of such endorsements.

Role of Influencers in the Aquabot Presale

Aquabot’s presale received substantial promotion from influential figures in the Solana ecosystem, which led many investors to trust the project. Well-known platforms and individuals endorsed the presale, touting its innovative approach and promising low trading fees.

However, the rug pull has exposed the risks of relying on influencers and unverified projects, especially in a space as volatile as crypto.

The involvement of these influencers has made the situation more complex, as critics argue that their endorsements contributed to the false sense of security that many investors felt. “Reputable protocols interact and make partnerships with ruggers, and then they act like nothing happened,” one community member remarked, voicing frustration over the lack of accountability in the ecosystem.

Growing Concerns Over Presale Scams in Solana

This incident is part of a broader trend of presale scams plaguing the Solana ecosystem. ZachXBT has previously warned about the risks of fraudulent projects, citing multiple instances where millions of SOL were raised during presales, only for the funds to vanish shortly after.

The Aquabot scam is just the latest in a series of rug pulls that have raised serious concerns about the safety of investing in presale projects on Solana.

The ecosystem’s rapid growth and increasing interest in new tokens make it a target for bad actors. As scams continue to emerge, the community is calling for greater transparency and stricter vetting of projects. “What we need—at the very least—is radical transparency across Solana,” ZachXBT stated, urging for more accountability in the space to protect investors from future scams.

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