Article reproduced from: Nancy.
Author: Nancy, PANews.
On the evening of December 17, the highly anticipated leading NFT project Pudgy Penguins announced its launch and the start of the airdrop, with over 100,000 claims made. The high traffic also caused the claim API to malfunction, and the airdrop was briefly paused before resuming. Binance data shows that the token PENGU peaked at $0.07 at opening, with a fully diluted valuation (FDV) reaching $6.2 billion, although the current price has since retreated.
From the perspective of airdrop eligibility inquiries, users can add multiple wallet addresses for queries at once, including holders of Pudgy Penguins series NFTs, Ethereum/Solana OG players, L2 Abstract Enjoyers, and various chain explorers, all of whom can receive PENGU tokens in the airdrop. The more conditions met, the more airdrop quantity received.
From the feedback of various players, in addition to NFT holders making substantial profits ranging from tens of thousands to millions of dollars, some veteran players opened multiple addresses to receive a hefty 'pork knuckle rice' meal. However, some users ended up with 'nothing' after querying dozens of addresses. Apart from the high returns brought by the airdrop, experienced traders also earned huge profits through on-chain price differences. According to Lookonchain monitoring, a trader made a profit of 36,984 SOL (about $836,000) by trading PENGU in less than 20 minutes. Additionally, a whale is buying heavily; Lookonchain monitored that one whale spent 15,300 SOL ($3.46 million) to purchase 6.47 million PENGU tokens at an average price of $0.053.
It is worth mentioning that according to on-chain analyst Ai Yi's detection, wallets associated with the PENGU project team (or early investors) are currently selling off large amounts on-chain, having sold PENGU worth $8.74 million.
During this airdrop frenzy, Pudgy Penguins not only successfully drove up the price of its NFTs but also further expanded its community and ecological influence. However, the profit-driven behavior triggered by the airdrop has also led to a lot of speculation, causing dissatisfaction within the community.
Using the airdrop event to boost NFT prices and expand the community.
With its flexible airdrop mechanism and extensive token distribution strategy, Pudgy Penguins has attracted a lot of attention in the past period and actively expanded its community size and ecological influence.
On one hand, unlike most projects that determine airdrop eligibility through snapshots, the Pudgy Penguins airdrop has no time limit. The token PENGU is allocated to relevant NFTs upon its launch, and holders have 88 days to apply. This flexible airdrop mechanism has also led to a massive buying spree for the Pudgy Penguins series NFTs, injecting strong upward momentum into their prices.
According to NFT Price Floor data, from the announcement of the token issuance plan on December 6 to its official launch, the floor price of Pudgy Penguins increased by as much as 133.6%, with Lil Pudgys rising by 165.7%. Meanwhile, the sales volume of the Pudgy Penguins series also surged significantly, with CryptoSlam statistics showing that during this period, Pudgy Penguins had sales exceeding $54 million, while Lil Pudgys reached $22.6 million.
On the other hand, Pudgy Penguins hopes to expand the community size through the airdrop. The token economic model of PENGU shows that in addition to 25.9% of the total token supply allocated to the Pudgy community, another 24.12% will be allocated to other communities. According to Pudgy Penguins, the Solana ecosystem will receive about 25% of the PENGU token supply airdrop, meaning that active users of applications like Phantom wallet and Jupiter can also receive airdrops without holding NFTs. This part of wallet addresses is about 7 million, covering users of multiple protocols and community members.
Additionally, in expanding the ecological scale, Pudgy Penguins' token has adopted a multi-chain deployment strategy. Besides being deployed on Solana, it will also launch on Ethereum and the anticipated L2 network Abstract Chain. Igloo, the parent company of Pudgy Penguins, stated that this move aims to create the largest on-chain community and expand the audience for the Pudgy Penguins ecosystem through multi-chain deployment.
The airdrop has triggered a surge in physical toy speculation, and the theft of QR codes has caused dissatisfaction.
Although the Pudgy Penguins airdrop event incentivized community members and promoted ecological development, it also triggered speculation chaos. As Pudgy Penguins' IP derivative toy Pudgy Toys was included in the airdrop, this toy quickly attracted the attention of many speculators and became the target of their rush to buy.
'I just hired a group of kids to help me shop at Walmart, can't wait for my airdrop.' 'I got a free 10x airdrop from Pudgy Penguins toys that no one wanted at Walmart. I spent $1,000 on this experiment and might buy more. I will donate these toys to kids for Christmas. No matter the outcome, it's a win-win.' 'I ordered 10,000 penguin toys from Amazon at $20 each. If each toy gets a $100 airdrop and I return these toys, I could make a profit of $1 million without any cost.'
Pudgy Toys are being snapped up.
On social media platforms, speculators are sharing their 'harvest' of buying Pudgy Penguins toys, attempting to profit by hoarding Pudgy Toys on a large scale. Compared to the risks of financial losses from purchasing high-premium NFTs for airdrops, buying physical toys can yield considerable gains without any cost.
Driven by profit, many speculators are even resorting to stealing QR codes (which grant access to Pudgy World) from Pudgy Penguins toys to profit, an act that detaches from the original cultural and emotional value of Pudgy Penguins, which has sparked controversy and criticism.
'$PENGU is about to be issued, and toys across North America are almost sold out. Is anyone willing to buy these QR codes?' Some users are selling the QR codes for Pudgy Penguins toys at high prices. Other users reported ordering penguin toys from Walmart, but some boxes were missing QR codes or toys.
Pudgy Toys QR codes have been damaged.
According to a post by Suji, the founder of Mask, 'Today, there were Web2.5 users in a New York store wanting to buy some Pudgy Penguins toys, but they found that several packaging boxes had been opened and the accompanying QR codes had been stolen. These toys were originally meant for those who truly love Pudgy Penguins. Even though many people accidentally lost their QR codes, they still enjoy the fun. However, with the launch of the airdrop, Degens flocked to the stores and engaged in this irresponsible behavior. This behavior is theft, and the entire crypto community should condemn it. Please leave the Pudgy Penguins toys for those who truly love them.'
Overall, the airdrop event of Pudgy Penguins has brought significant ecological expansion and market enthusiasm to the project. However, how to maintain a balance between promoting economic incentives and preserving cultural spirit and community values has become an important topic that Pudgy Penguins and other crypto projects need to deeply contemplate and prioritize for long-term development.
