The Turbulent Year of friend.tech: From Paradigm Investment to Soft Rug
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The Turbulent Year of friend.tech: From Paradigm Investment to Soft Rug
Since its launch, it has generated approximately $89.29 million in fee revenue, of which $44.67 million has been distributed to creators, with the remaining portion retained by the Friend.tech team.
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsAuthor: shushu
If one image were to describe Friend.Tech.
On September 8, 2024, Friend.Tech, once a popular crypto social app, announced that its project management and ownership parameters had been set to the Ethereum null address (0x000...000), effectively locking the current system and preventing any further changes. This move signifies that Friend.Tech has relinquished control over its smart contracts, indicating the platform is essentially shut down.
Created by anonymous developer Racer, Friend.Tech launched on Base on August 10, 2023. On its first day, it reached 136,000 daily active users.
On August 15, Friend.Tech announced it would airdrop reward points to app testers. These points were collected off-chain during testing and promised special utility upon the app’s official release—planting early seeds for a future airdrop.
On August 19, Friend.Tech announced it had completed a seed round, with Paradigm participating in the investment.
Ten days after launch, on August 21, Friend.Tech surpassed 1,000 ETH in revenue, reaching 1,165.2 ETH. The protocol’s total trading volume hit 25,633.5 ETH, with a total user market cap of 10,663.3 ETH. In 24 hours, the protocol generated $1.12 million in fees, outperforming both Uniswap and the Bitcoin network at the time, ranking only behind Ethereum and Lido.
On August 30, Friend.Tech disclosed platform data showing approximately 20,000 key holders checked their rooms daily, with a next-day retention rate above 75% and weekly retention above 50%. Additionally, active key holders spent over 30 minutes per day on average using Friend.Tech.
By September 1, daily trading volume had plummeted from $16 million on August 21 to about $700,000—a drop exceeding 95%.
Late August to early September 2023: Friend.Tech’s revenue trough
After resolving technical issues and overcoming a trust crisis, protocol revenue rebounded. On September 8, DeFiLlama data showed Friend.Tech’s TVL surged past $10 million, reaching $10.35 million—the highest since its August launch.
On September 14, Dune analytics revealed Friend.Tech protocol fees exceeded 5,000 ETH, hitting 5,063.104 ETH (worth ~$8.375 million), with cumulative transactions reaching 4,597,737. The previous day saw 538,000 transactions—a record high—with transaction value around 12,390 ETH (~$20.07 million).
On September 21, Friend.Tech launched its web version, enabling browser access.
On October 1, Dune data showed Friend.Tech protocol revenue reached 10,319.6 ETH, total trading volume hit 227,030.3 ETH, and total user market cap stood at 54,244.63 ETH.
On November 20, multiple community sources reported that many legitimate friend.tech accounts were falsely flagged as bots, resulting in those users not receiving their allocated points that week.
On November 26, Friend.Tech founder Racer’s Twitter account @0xRacerAlt became inaccessible.
In the following months, Friend.Tech’s official Twitter updates slowed significantly. By late February 2024, hints about V2 began emerging. During this period, the Friend.Tech team started cashing out. On December 3, the protocol’s fee-receiving address (0xdd9) transferred 7,821 ETH (~$16.94 million) to Coinbase four hours prior.
Throughout March, Friend.Tech’s official Twitter remained silent on product updates.
On April 27, Friend.Tech announced via social media that data repairs and snapshots were complete, and point balances had been finalized.
Read more: How chaotic was Friend.tech's token distribution?
On May 3, Friend.Tech opened claims for its airdropped token FRIEND, which initially traded at $3.34.
On May 4, Friend.Tech officially launched its V2 version.
On May 18, Dune data showed that since the V2 launch, Club count reached 225,088, total trading volume hit 27,670,735 FRIEND, and Club fees accumulated to 398,145 FRIEND.
With the airdrop settled and V2 officially released, judging by Friend.Tech’s Twitter activity, account engagement noticeably increased throughout April and May—even engaging in meme-worthy antics.
Read more: "Only the rich can use FT"—Is Friend.tech turning into a controversial sensation?
On May 27, Friend.Tech co-founder Racer expressed intentions on social media to migrate Friend.Tech off Base. Racer stated the team had always had an unstable relationship with Base, feeling “excluded by the Base community.” At the time of writing, Racer’s X account is temporarily inaccessible. In response, Jesse Pollak, head of Coinbase’s Base, acknowledged that the Friend.Tech team felt “isolated and disconnected” from Base and parts of the Ethereum ecosystem.
On June 11, Friend.Tech’s multisig address transferred 2,809 ETH (~$10.11 million) to Coinbase.
On June 20, Friend.Tech announced plans to launch Friend Chain. Officially, it declared a partnership with Conduit to build Friendchain, a social-dedicated chain built on Base with FRIEND as its gas token. However, Friend.Tech later deleted the post, abandoning the Friendchain vision and deciding, based on community feedback, not to migrate FRIEND to another chain.
The entire month of July saw no activity from Friend.Tech’s official Twitter account. On July 9, there were only 5 unique buyers and 10 unique sellers, with daily active users hitting an all-time low.
Another August arrived. Friend.Tech’s official Twitter now posts just one update per day—the names of five trending clubs—appearing like a final act of surrender after a period of intense hype.
This continued until September 8, when the platform issued a final announcement declaring Friend.Tech effectively defunct—developers had relinquished control over the smart contract by transferring ownership to Ethereum’s null address, freezing the system and blocking further modifications. “No fees from the smart contract or website will flow to the Friend.Tech development team’s multisig wallet,” the announcement stated. While the platform may appear to remain operational, the loss of control makes introducing new features nearly impossible. Revoking contract ownership also prevents any new team from acquiring and reviving the platform.
From the strained relationship with Base to the failed Friend Chain vision, Friend.Tech has been in freefall since launching V2 and distributing its airdrop. Since its inception, Friend.Tech has generated approximately $89.29 million in fee revenue, with $44.67 million distributed to creators and the remainder going to the Friend.Tech team. Reflecting on its journey over the past year, the once-soaring unicorn now stands abandoned—a poignant reminder of crypto’s fleeting highs.
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