Key takeaways

• Ether dipped to the $2,600 region following Bybit’s hack on Friday but now trades above $2,700 per coin. 
• iDEGEN has raised nearly $25 million as presale ends in two days.

ETH could rally higher after dipping on Bybit hack

Ether, the second-largest cryptocurrency by market cap, has been volatile over the past few days. It was trading around $2,850 on Friday before crashing to $2,620 later that day after the crypto exchange Bybit was hacked. 

The hack saw nearly $1.5 billion worth of ETH and stETH wiped from Bybit’s cold storage wallet. However, ETH’s price has slightly recovered since then and could rally higher in the near term. At press time, the price of Ether stands at $2,727, down nearly 2% in the last 24 hours. 

What is iDEGEN?

Bybit’s hack is the biggest in the cryptocurrency market’s history so far, but how the company handled the situation inspired confidence in investors. As investors acknowledge the maturity level of the crypto market, more funds continue to flow into new and exciting projects. 

iDEGEN is one of the projects that has raised millions of dollars from investors. It is a leading memecoin and AI project that would offer massive utility to its users by launching several products and services. iDEGEN has already raised nearly $25 million and will use the funds to develop its products. 

In its whitepaper, the project developers revealed that iDEGEN is a meme project that leverages the benefits of AI to create the next billion-dollar memecoin. It is an AI tool that primarily functions as such. 

The tool continuously evolves and adapts by leveraging community feeds on X. While iDEGEN is powered by AI, degens ultimately raise the tool. The native token, $IDGN, will power all the various activities within the ecosystem. 

The team explained that $IDGN’s launch as a memecoin stems from the recent growth of the meme narrative in the crypto space. The AI and memecoin narratives were the best performers in 2024, delivering thousands of percentages in ROI to investors. 

The iDEGEN token will launch on exchanges in three days, signalling the end of the presale and ushering in the project’s utility phase. With the iDEGEN tool, users can feed their data through tweets, tags, and comments. 

The tool absorbs the post and adds it to its knowledge base; that’s how it learns. In addition, iDEGEN posts on X every 60 minutes and can generate and post memes. 

iDEGEN’s presale nears $25m as listing date approaches

The iDEGEN token will be listed on exchanges starting from the 27th of February as it ushers in its utility phase. As the listing data approaches, the presale is coming to an end in two days, with nearly $25 million raised from investors over the last few weeks. 

In the current stage, the $IDGN token is worth $0.0345, and its price will increase to $0.0380 in the next stage. The next stage will be the final one and will give early investors a massive ROI before the token launches on exchanges. 

Why buy the $IDGN token now?

The iDEGEN presale ends in two days, and the token will start listing on exchanges immediately after that. Despite that, buying $IDGN tokens now could be an excellent opportunity to get in early on the project. 

The project offers a unique value proposition to investors and users thanks to its numerous utilities. While it is a memecoin, iDEGEN will offer various use cases to its community and the broader crypto market. 

With the right level of adoption, its native $IDGN token could gain massive adoption within the iDEGEN and broader crypto ecosystem. This could give early investors excellent ROI in the coming weeks and months.

Recent reports suggest that rapper and entrepreneur Kanye West, now known as Ye, may have sold his X (formerly Twitter) account to Barkmeta. The sale allegedly comes ahead of a planned crypto launch.

The project has raised concerns, with allegations that untrustworthy third-party groups with a track record of fraud are involved. Crypto influencers are raising red flags, warning that it could be a potential scam.

At the center of the controversy is Barkmeta. Barkmeta is a meme coin trader and Doginals figure who is said to have acquired Ye’s X account. Industry insiders have long accused Barkmeta of orchestrating fraudulent ventures.

On-chain analyst Blade pointed to a troubling track record of Barkmeta. 

“He has over 200k live audience and post crypto staff daily. What you don’t know is that he is also one of the biggest Twitter scammers,” the post read.

In 2022, Barkmeta allegedly masterminded the POX token rug pull. More recently, in 2023, Barkmeta collaborated with well-known crypto traders to launch the DeFiApes non-fungible token (NFT) collection. The project raked in over 22,000 Ethereum (ETH). 

It was valued at more than $40 million at the time. Nevertheless, the team reportedly abandoned it, triggering a price collapse that wiped out over 90% of investors’ funds.

Blade also drew attention to mounting evidence of his ties to Ye’s crypto venture. 

“Kanye West sold his X account for $17 MILLION. The most anticipated meme coin launch is Barkmeta’s RUGPULL,” he remarked.

Following Ye’s announcement of an upcoming token launch, Barkmeta hosted a Twitter Space to hype the project. He boldly proclaimed it to be “the biggest meme coin” and promised easy profits for all. 

Yet, as the discussion unfolded, Blade noted Barkmeta’s evasive responses to critical questions, describing him as tense and unconvincing. 

Adding to the suspicion, Ye’s official X account began following one of Barkmeta’s team members, known as Tall—a figure Blade alleges is an alternate Barkmeta account.

Another suspicious detail Blade highlighted was a dramatic shift in his writing style. His posts were exclusively about cryptocurrency, aggressively hyping up the meme coin launch.

“The chance of YE’s sold account is above 95%. I do not recommend you to buy Kanye’s meme coin in any case,” he concluded.

Further complicating matters, users have also alleged that Barkmeta controls the AB84 X account. On February 23, the account promoted a supposed “Yeezy Coin.” The token was quickly exposed as a scam after being rug pulled within hours.

“So the team that dropped a fake Ye scam coin yesterday is now part of the official coin. (FYI AB doesn’t even know what happened yesterday because he sold his account),” another user posted.

Nonetheless, Barkmeta poked fun at the situation.

“Kanye West 100% sold his account (to me) comparing his early tweets to his tweets now, completely different in almost every way (because it’s me) people don’t change that radically that quickly, regardless of personal situation (because I’m on it),” he posted.

The account also shared an image showing two phones. One allegedly was logged into Ye’s X account, and the other displayed his own. The post intensified speculation that Barkmeta had direct access to Ye’s social media.

In response, Ye denied any involvement. 

“This is not real. I don’t know this person,” he said

He acknowledged past betrayals but called his coin launch “next level.” 

“When I do launch my coin I will make it very clear and very official,” he added.

While the launch date has yet to be confirmed, a crypto user has reported that the official Ye meme coin, YZY, appears to have been deployed. 

According to the user, Yeezy customers received a message directing them to a website called BankofYZY. Yet, he cautioned against interacting with the link. 

“I’m not completely certain it’s not a leak from the Yeezy database, but the token does exist, although it is currently without liquidity,” he stated.

With mounting concerns over Barkmeta’s role and Ye’s sudden shift in online activity, the crypto community is bracing for what comes next.