One of CrypToadz’s non-fungible tokens (nft), whose average price does not exceed $1,000, was purchased for a staggering 1,055 Wrapped ethereum (wETH), equivalent to $1.6 million.
The deal ethereum/0x1cb1a5e65610aeff2551a50f76a87a7d3fb649c6/4030″ target=”_blank” rel=”noopener nofollow”>occurred at the OpenSea market on October 9. The nft represents “a small, warty, amphibious creature,” one of 6,969 units minted by pseudonymous digital artist Gremplin. The CrypToadz collection was launched during the nft boom of 2021 and surpassed a trading volume of 12,000 Ether (eth) ($38 million) during its first 10 days on the market.
The shopping wallet was funded by a wallet that has been withdrawing money from Tornado Cash.https://t.co/nNhKvSVhoz pic.twitter.com/aInHO8vNyG
– TexasHedge (@0xTexasHedge) October 9, 2023
However, the price paid by the anonymous user for the nft raised doubts among the community. Two weeks ago, this item was purchased for 0.95 eth (around $1,600), only to be sold for a thousand times that price.
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Additionally, the purchase was funded from a digital wallet, which has been part of the transaction chain, anonymized by the ethereum coin mixing service Tornado Cash. The new owner of the CrypToadz nft received 1,115.9 eth ($1.6 million) on October 5.
Although some X (Twitter) users privileged To call the odd purchase a “fat finger mistake” during the transaction, it could be an example of wash trading, a tactic to withdraw funds of suspicious origin through a long chain of transactions and exchanges.
Tornado Cash is famous for its popularity among scammers looking to launder their funds. In August 2023, the United States Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) even announced sanctions against the cryptocurrency mixer for its alleged role in laundering criminal proceeds. However, these sanctions could not completely prevent the use of the mixer.
For example, in July 2023, nearly $60 million worth of Ether, stolen from AnubisDAO two years earlier, moved through Tornado Cash. The person holding the 13,556 eth divided and transferred the funds into 100 eth transactions.
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