Analysis

Curve Whipsaws 75% as DeFi Degens Squeeze Avraham Eisenberg 

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CRV has skilled a 75% swing after self-described “utilized sport theorist” Avraham Eisenberg launched a plan to quick the token that seems to have backfired. 

Curve Whale Video games

Considered one of crypto’s most notorious whales is waging struggle on Curve. 

Avraham Eisenberg, the self-described “utilized sport theorist” liable for final month’s $100 million Mango Markets exploit, has began shorting Curve DAO’s CRV token. On-chain sleuths noticed Tuesday morning that Eisenberg had borrowed 88 million CRV tokens from lending protocol Aave and bought them onto the market early over the previous week. 

Curve Finance is a decentralized trade specializing in stablecoins and different low-volatility belongings to take care of low slippage and costs. It’s usually thought-about a extra conservative choice in DeFi, and is standard amongst liquidity suppliers for that motive. CRV is its governance token.

The stress generated by Eisenberg’s promoting pushed CRV all the way down to $0.40, permitting him to borrow much more CRV from Aave’s Curve pool to promote. Many onlookers speculate Eisenberg was focusing on Curve founder Michael Egorov together with his quick promoting. Egorov reportedly holds loans on Aave backed by CRV token collateral with a liquidation value of $0.25. If Eisenberg can push the CRV value to this degree, it’s going to set off Aave’s liquidation contract and promote Egorov’s CRV onto the market to repay his debt, pushing costs additional down.

Nonetheless, a number of whales picked up on Eisenberg’s assault and began opening lengthy positions to extend the CRV token value. “First, he got here for Mango, and I didn’t communicate out,” tweeted PleasrDAO member Andrew Kang Tuesday, accompanied by an image of his CRV lengthy place. “Now, he tries to hunt the mortgage of one of many godfather’s of DeFi and that’s when the foot is put all the way down to defend.”

Within the following hours, Curve steadily climbed, ultimately hitting Eisenberg’s liquidation degree simply above $0.60. Aave’s liquidation mechanism began promoting his USDC collateral to purchase again CRV tokens off the market to repay his debt. Nonetheless, it seems that many who had gone lengthy on Curve earlier at this time at $0.40 additionally began taking income round this degree, reducing the liquidation quick. Altogether, about $5 million of Eisenberg’s place was liquidated in that occasion; on the time of writing, his place had begun to liquidate again, pushing CRV to over $0.70.

CRV/USD chart (Supply: Binance through TradingView)

Whereas many onlookers mark this episode as a loss for Eisenberg, others are usually not satisfied. Earlier than Eisenberg’s Aave place began to get liquidated, he cryptically tweeted, “Taking the time off to spend time with household, hope y’all behave yourselves.” This publish was extensively perceived as “psyops,” or techniques meant to govern one’s opponents or enemies utilizing psychology. The thought is that Eisenberg is trying to lure his opponents right into a false sense of safety earlier than revealing his final plan.

Eisenberg might even have a a lot bigger off-chain lengthy place on CRV, intending for his Aave mortgage to get liquidated from the begin to spur on CRV bulls and revenue from the volatility. Others preserve that he’s biding his time earlier than utilizing extra capital to push the CRV value down and take one other shot at Egorov’s $0.25 liquidation value. 

Another barely outlandish concept is that Egorov and Eisenberg deliberate the entire spectacle from the begin to generate curiosity within the Curve protocol. Coincidentally, Egorov published the code for Curve’s upcoming stablecoin earlier at this time on GitHub. 

Eisenberg has grow to be notorious in crypto circles after he used value manipulation techniques to empty the Solana-based Mango Markets protocol of $100 million of person funds in October. After revealing himself to the general public, Eisenberg reduce a cope with the Mango Market’s group, returning half the stolen funds to cowl person losses if Mango Markets used its treasury funds to assist cowl losses. 

Eisenberg referred to as the Mango Markets exploit a “extremely worthwhile buying and selling technique,” sparking outrage within the DeFi group. Whereas some within the DeFi group imagine Eisenberg did nothing incorrect, others have closely criticized his actions and their unfavorable impact on the house. 

Whether or not Eisenberg has been crushed or if his partial liquidation was all a part of his plan stays to be seen. DeFi fanatics can be watching carefully to see what occurs subsequent. Eisenberg additionally seems to be transferring cash round, presumably to deposit as collateral to cease his Aave liquidation.

Disclosure: On the time of scripting this piece, the writer owned ETH and several other different cryptocurrencies. 

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