Pudgy Penguins, the third-largest NFT assortment by market capitalization, introduced Thursday night that it is launching a brand new token known as PENGU on the Solana blockchain earlier than the 12 months ends.
The announcement is available in as Pudgy Penguins’ NFT assortment flooring value hit a brand new all-time excessive amid surging crypto market valuations.
In keeping with the challenge, it should distribute 88 billion PENGU tokens to NFT homeowners who’ve Pudgy Penguins, Lil Pudgys, Pudgy Rods, and different collections related to the challenge.
The token’s provide can be allotted based mostly on the next distribution: 23.5% is reserved for present Pudgy Penguins NFT holders, whereas 22.02% is reserved for the broader Solana and Ethereum communities. A further 12.32% will present liquidity on decentralized exchanges.
Pudgy Penguins launched in July 2021 with 8,888 NFT items, with the “8” working as a metaphor alluding to how the comical characters look.
Primarily based on the announcement video shared by Pudgy Penguins, the PENGU token is taken into account by its lore because the “Grasp Coin,” which the core crew of seven will “hatch” from a golden egg as a logo of their “collective may.”
Decrypt has reached out to Pudgy Penguins on its selection of Solana.
Shifting tides
The gathering’s flooring value surged greater than 40% this week to succeed in a brand new all-time excessive above $62,000, surpassing its earlier peak of $57,000 in February 2024, Decrypt reported Thursday.
The rise coincides with Bitcoin’s breakthrough above $100,000 and displays broader market momentum affecting main NFT collections.
Pudgy Penguins has maintained a robust market presence regardless of historic NFT market volatility, with a complete market capitalization of round $550 million.
The model has expanded past digital belongings, producing over $10 million in bodily toy gross sales by main retailers, together with Walmart, Goal, and Walgreens.
The PENGU token launch represents a strategic pivot as market consideration shifts from NFTs to fungible tokens and meme cash.
On X (previously Twitter), Pudgy Penguins pointed to this shift with a publish saying: “Tides are shifting. A brand new starting is upon us.”
The transfer addresses historic NFT liquidity challenges whereas leveraging Pudgy Penguins’ established model presence, which incorporates over 3 million social media followers and 32 billion views on Giphy.
Crypto’s bull run can be driving NFTs greater, Decrypt reported on Monday. This surge has helped push the general NFT market capitalization to about $8.6 billion, in line with CoinGecko information, whereas weekly Ethereum NFT buying and selling quantity doubled to exceed $101 million.Â
The challenge’s transformation started when Luca Netz acquired it in 2022, increasing from a struggling NFT assortment right into a outstanding crypto-native model. Netz projected formidable progress for the challenge in July, suggesting a possible flooring value goal of 200 ETH (roughly $780,000 at present charges) throughout this market cycle.
The challenge plans to ultimately combine with Summary, an upcoming Ethereum Layer-2 answer, although the fast focus stays on establishing PENGU’s presence within the Solana ecosystem.
Edited Sebastian Sinclair
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