- The founder of Yearn.finance Andre Cronje could face a lawsuit over the Eminence farce
- The EMN token was released while still in test status, but speculators still bought in
- A hacker drained the contract just hours later, and they want their money back
Andre Cronje may be a revered figure in the crypto space to many, but not everyone is a fan right now – a group of aggrieved investors are planning to take him to court over the Eminence farce. The Yearn.finance creator released the Eminence token (EMN) to the Ethereum network as part of a test of the new protocol last month, but it was snapped up by a number of opportunists who lost everything when the contract was hacked just hours later. These investors are now raising funds to sue the Yearn.finance founder, blaming him squarely for their loss.
The Swift Rise and Fall of Eminence
Cronje was working on Eminence, a decentralized gaming platform, toward the end of September, and as part of the testing process released the EMN token to the Ethereum platform, something he has since said he always does. On this occasion however, it was picked up by eagle eyed Uniswap bargain hunters, who thought that the project might be intentionally being kept under the radar for the time being.
Just hours after the Eminence hype began to build however the smart contract was hacked and $16 million worth of tokens were minted and sold, crashing the price and killing the token.
EMN Investigation Receives Little Support
Some of those who lost out have now formed EMN Investigation, a group whose goal is to “finance a lawsuit against Andre Cronje, Kirby and Banteg over the EMN scandal on behalf of the victims”, citing the project’s Head of Communications and a YFI developer as also being at fault.
EMN Investigation claims that “Andre watched as $15 million poured in without a word” and “kept hyping the project by retweeting” despite knowing the token was a worthless test, also blaming the other Yearn team members for profiting by selling the Eminence token as the value was increasing.
EMN Investigation have asked for Ethereum donations to finance their lawsuit against the Eminence team, but perhaps unsurprisingly they have received little sympathy, with many claiming that it is the investors’ fault if they have lost money on a token that had no information other than a ticker and a tweet:
“We put money into something that someone randomly found on the internet and the creator hadnt completely tested and revealed to the public yet, we want to sue people because we make stupid decisions” I hope you guys spend a fuckload on this and lose more money 🙂
— Jacket (@bitcoinjacket) October 11, 2020
