The May 11 crash of the Terra USD (UST) was similar to Basis Cash (BAC). Launched on Ethereum in late 2020, BAC was hugely popular in the DeFi industry. Just like UST, while it was algorithmically pegged at $1 in BAC, it lost stability in early 2021 and is currently trading at $0.00713044…
Shock claim about Terra founder
Now the price of Terra USD seems to be recurring as it trades below $1. The claim is that Terraform Labs CEO Do Kwon is one of the mysterious co-founders behind the failed algorithmic stablecoin Basis Cash. Hyungsuk Kang, a former engineer at Terraform Labs (TFL), says Basis Cash is actually a side project of some of Terra’s early founders, including himself and Kwon. Kang eventually left TFL to form a Terra rival called Standard Protocol.
Another Basis Cash founder, who supports the claims on condition that it is confidential, confirms that Do Kwon and TFL employees are behind the project. Both Kang and the anonymous employee say Kwon is the pseudonymous co-founder “Rick Sanchez” seen in the message above. Terra founder Do Kwon has not yet responded to these allegations.
Basis Cash never reached the top of other Kwon-linked crypto projects
Total value locked (TVL), below double Terra’s $30 billion TVL before historic sale this week, February 2021 For a short time, it reached $174 million. Inspired by Basis, which came up with the idea of an algorithmic stablecoin as early as 2018, Basis Cash shut down after operating for a while due to regulatory concerns. Later, Do Kwon revived the project in late 2020 under the pseudonym “Rick” and with his as-yet-unidentified co-founder “Morty”.
The allegations came at a time when Kwon’s flagship project, Terra, was facing complete collapse. UST has been bearish over the weekend and is currently trading at $0.692. Meanwhile, Terra’s other token, LUNA, which was traded around $85 last week, is currently at $1.77, as we have covered in Cryptokoin.com analysis.