After announcing the end of its UNDW3 NFT collections in early August, Lacoste closed the project's social media on Friday. Faced with this, part of the community showed its discontent by accusing the brand of having led a rug pull. What do we know?
Lacoste: It’s over for the UNDW3 NFT collections
It's now been a little over 2 years, Lacoste caused a sensation by entering the non-fungible token (NFT) market. A first collection called UNDW3, which evolved last year, then the collection “The Emerge”.
While the promise was great, including exclusive access to brand events, in reality, the collections have come up against the difficulties inherent in the NFT market in recent years. As a result, volumes and prices have suffered an increasingly noticeable decline, so much so that at the beginning of August, The brand announced the end of the initiative.
From then on, the grumbling began to be felt, while the company promised ” a new experience centered around creation and play” Contacted by Capital, Lacoste then tried to reassure its fans:
The project does not end, but evolves into a broader initiative that aims to offer a more inclusive and accessible experience to all fans of the brand.
After the announcement of the discontinuation of the collections, an investor sent an email to the brand to request compensation. In response, Lacoste recalled its own general conditionsblaming the market environment for the decline and refusing any compensation. It particularly highlights the fact that a “evolution of this program” had been announced in January:
@Lacoste does not want to admit that they made a mistake with their project and hide behind their general conditions. but does not answer my questions here is their answer during my discussions with their legal department of the group having 12 #ETH in this project, a procedure… pic.twitter.com/euJ0zlL6Vp
— @Fv20000 (@Fv20000) August 28, 2024
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However, the community's anger took another turn on Friday, when the project's networks were shut down.
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X, website, UNDW3 no longer gives any sign of life
Indeed, if you want to go to the official website of the NFT UNDW3 collections to find out more about what happens next, you'll be disappointed. And for good reason, This one is no longer active today :
Figure 1 — Lacoste UNDW3 website
Furthermore, note that the same applies to the project's X account, which has been deleted:
Figure 2 — Lacoste UNDW3 X-account
All this has therefore fueled the concerns of the community, some of which do not hesitate to call these actions a rug pull :
1/3 🧶I hope someone with the expertise will investigate the Soft Rug by @Lacoste with @undw3_lacoste. They reportedly siphoned around 1000 ETH from the crypto market with their 2022 mint, delivering only a minimal product while promising much more. pic.twitter.com/7R9Jk0EAnW
— The Crepiste (@LeCrepiste) August 29, 2024
Asked by his followers who wanted to know more, the entrepreneur and content creator, Owen Simonin (Hasheur), indicated on X that he had contacted Lacoste to ask for explanations:
I am waiting for a response from the teams. I have not had any interactions with them in over two years, but I want answers.
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On the brand's official X account, no additional statement has yet been made to clarify the situation. It will now be a question of observing whether Lacoste will stop there, or whether more information will be provided on the continuation of the events.
As of today, the floor prices of The Emerge and UNDW3 Card are 0.0085 and 0.0079 ETH respectively. At the current price, this represents just around twenty dollars, a reduction of about 5 times compared to the launch price.
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Source: Capital, Opensea
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Since 2021, I have devoted my free time to seriously training myself on cryptocurrencies in order to acquire as much knowledge and credibility as possible. I often have the opportunity to conduct interviews with influential figures in the blockchain industry. I also conduct in-depth analyses on Web3 themes to offer exclusive content to Cryptoast readers.
Vincent Maire
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