TAC Protocol’s attempt to explain away a trading session where its TAC token lost around 90% of its value has stirred skepticism from holders after the project’s July 8 statement on X ruled out any exploit and also denied any foul play in the form of insider selling too, pinning the collapse on forced selling in the futures market. 

However, onchain researchers have presented a conflicting theory, saying the chain of transactions tells a different story as fingers point to a coordinated exit by 18 wallets.

What is the TAC team’s explanation of the events?

“The protocol operates exactly as designed,” the TAC account wrote, adding that the network “was not hacked in any form” and that onchain assets stayed secure.

The team stated, “The decline was a liquidation cascade triggered initially by a large perpetual futures sell order exceeding the relatively thin liquidity on the market.”

The team also stated that neither its own holdings nor those of early investors moved because both remain under vesting locks.

To restore confidence, TAC stated that they are focused on strengthening their market structure and deepening liquidity, though it disclosed no specifics.

Were insiders selling TAC?

Although they stopped short of pointing the finger at people with connections to TAC Protocol, a July 8 post by onchain analyst EmberCN counted 18 wallets offloading about 372 million TAC and walking away with 1.78 million USD1.

The tokens were moved off TAC’s native chain onto BNB Chain first, where they were sold. By EmberCN’s measure, the price fell 91%, from about $0.05 to $0.0045.

EmberCN stated, “This coin bears a striking resemblance in onchain dumping tactics to $SIREN from a month ago and $AKE from yesterday—it’s highly likely they’re all being manipulated by the same ‘conspiracy syndicate.’”

What are TAC Protocol’s numbers now?

The protocol’s native token, TAC, was trading around $0.065 at the end of June but now trades around $0.0026, a decline of around 96%.

It has a market cap over $12.2 million, and DefiLlama put its total value locked on the TAC chain at around $1.27 million.

This is not TAC’s first violent week, as the token had already dropped about 82% in a day, roughly two months after a $2.8 million bridge exploit on May 11 that the team reclassified as a white-hat incident once the attacker returned about 90% of the funds.

TAC reopened cross-chain transfers between TON and its own network on June 10.