Fantom Sets $6.5M Dev Funds for 'Safer Memecoins’ Launch

Layer-1 blockchain Fantom ( FTM ) is pioneering the idea of “safer meme coins” by setting aside $6.5 million worth of its native Fantom ( FTM ) token as a reward to devs as it tries to get a slice of the nearly $50 billion sector.

Fantom Foundation CEO Michael Kong said he wants to create "an environment where people can launch what we call ‘safer meme coins” and introduce technical and non-technical measures to ensure projects aren’t “just an outright rug or scam.”

Solana and Coinbase’s Ethereum layer 2 Base have seen the bulk of the recent memecoin trading fenzy with trading volumes on Solana even surpassing Ethereum’s at the peak of the memecoin rush in March.

However, as many as one in six of meme coins on Base were revealed to be scams and at least 12 sizeable meme-based projects on Solana — which raised a combined $26.7 million — were all rugpulled by the creators.

In a bid to attract memecoin traders to Fantom as well as increase safety measures around the tokens, Kong announced during the April 30 MemeGlobal event in Sydney that the Fantom Foundation was setting up a 10 million Fantom ( FTM ) prize pool — worth $6.5 million — to memecoin teams.

Kong said that “The meme coin phenomenon that exists right now is a method for us to acquire a lot of customers because we’ve seen that be successful with other chains and we want to replicate that success,”.

in the long run, it’s about what the customer wants. If the customer wants DeFi, give them DeFi. NFTs? Give them NFTs, and when it comes to meme coins, give them meme coins — or at least an environment that allows people to develop memecoins safely. Said Kong.

Andre Cronje the Foundation’s co-founder proposed measures for safe meme coins earlier in April including memecoin devs issuing their token with the Fantom Foundation as a co-controller of the token’s startup liquidity.

Cronje also proposed the token supply split — 5% to the team and 10% for marketing that’s locked in a multi-sig wallet needing at least one Foundation member as a co-signer.

85% left would be placed in an FTM paired liquidity pool (LP) with the Foundation pitching in 100,000 FTM — worth around $65,000 at current prices.

“Should the FTM in the LP token reach at least 2,000,000 FTM , the original provided 100,000 FTM (5%) will be removed to cover the initial cost and the rest of the LP will be burned,” Cronje wrote.

Fantom ( FTM ) is the 38th largest blockchain network with a total value locked (TVL) of $108.3 million, according to DefiLlama. For comparison, Solana and Base are respectively the fourth and sixth largest by TVL.