Mantra and Story Protocol Collapse, DeFiance Capital Founder Highlights Price Manipulation?

Jakarta, Pintu News—The crypto market is abuzz again after Arthur Cheong, founder of DeFiance Capital, warned that price manipulation is becoming more prevalent.

This incident came to light after the collapse in the value of Mantra (OM) and Story Protocol (IP) tokens, which raised serious concerns for investor confidence.

Check out the full news below!

Market Manipulation: A Real Threat to Investors

Arthur Cheong in a post on X on April 14, revealed that more and more projects and market makers are collaborating clandestinely to manipulate token prices.

This creates a non-transparent market, where it is difficult to distinguish between organic demand and supply with coordinated manipulation. Cheong added that centralized exchanges appear to ignore this problem, creating an unhealthy market where insiders benefit while investors bear the risk.

Most recent token generation events have performed poorly, with prices falling between 70-90% after listing. Cheong emphasized that the biggest problem facing liquid crypto markets today is that it is unclear how projects and market makers can collaborate to create artificial prices that can last.

Also read: Apple and Google Stop Access to 14 Crypto Apps in South Korea!

Mantra Case and Story Protocol: Real Examples of Investor Losses

Mantra (OM) tokens experienced a 90% drop in value in less than 24 hours, wiping out more than $5 billion from the market capitalization. Independent crypto analysts pointed out that Mantra had moved millions of OM tokens to OKX just before the price crash, although Mantra denied the claims.

With 90% of the token supply controlled by the team, many believed this was a case of insider selling masquerading as a market event. CEO Mantra denied any wrongdoing, blaming the fallout on the liquidation of CEX.

Meanwhile, the Story Protocol (IP) token also saw a 25% drop in an hour, dropping from $4.24 to $3.02 before partially recovering. Binance and OKX, which were both involved in the OM crash, dominated trading volumes.

Binance stated the fallout was caused by forced liquidations, while OKX pointed to changes in tokenomics and suspicious deposits.

Also read: Top 10 Cryptos Ready to Lead the Rally in April 2025

Manipulation Spreads to Decentralized Markets

Price manipulation not only occurs in centralised markets, but has also spread to decentralised markets. Last month, a trader at Hyperliquid opened a $5 million short position on the JELLY token, then liquidated the position himself by pumping the token’s price on-chain, causing losses to Hyperliquid’s vault.

Dr. Jan Philipp Fritsche of Oak Security described this as “a textbook case of unappreciated vega risk,” pointing out that vulnerabilities in DeFi design can still be exploited even without technical bugs.

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This content aims to enrich readers’ information. Pintu collects this information from various relevant sources and is not influenced by outside parties. Note that an asset’s past performance does not determine its projected future performance. Crypto trading activities have high risk and volatility, always do your own research and use cold cash before investing. All activities of buying and selling bitcoin and other crypto asset investments are the responsibility of the reader.

Reference

• Crypto News. Defiance Capital Founder Warns of Rising Price Manipulation Amid Mantra and Story Protocol Crashes. Accessed on April 16, 2025
• Featured Image: generated by ai