gm Bankless Nation, Pudgy Penguins is launching PENGU, a fungible token, aiming to expand its iconic brand beyond NFTs and into mainstream circles. What comes next?
Today's Issue ⬇️
❄️ News Roundup: The PENGU Pump A token to broaden the Pudgy Penguins appeal.
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Pudgy Penguins, the 3rd-largest NFT collection by market cap (~$655M), is launching an official fungible token, PENGU, before year's end.
This makes sense to me. A divisible fungible token is obviously much more accessible (you can buy in with a $1 or less) than one of the 10k indivisible Pudgy NFT collectibles (the floor of which are currently +18 ETH a pop).
With this accessibility, the Pudgy Penguins are aiming to bring new community members in from mainstream circles, where the iconic project has recently been dominating via retail sales (e.g. Pudgy Toys in Walmart) and social media engagement (e.g. +50 billion views on top platforms).
In other words, the PENGU token is an opportunity to expand the foothold of the Pudgy Penguins beyond just the project's NFT base.
What we know so far is that the PENGU token will have an 88,888,888,888 total supply.
Among various allocations, some 25% of this supply is slotted for the current Pudgy community and 24% is slotted for other as-yet unknown communities, so whatever happens, a big airdrop is coming in the near future.
Also of note is how PENGU is going to be launched on Solana!
Of course, the Pudgy Penguins parent company, Igloo Inc., is currently developing its own consumer crypto Ethereum Layer 2 (L2), Abstract. Why not launch on Abstract, then?
Firstly, the Abstract mainnet isn't ready yet. Secondly, choosing Solana lets the Penguins set up a beachhead in one of the most active blockchain ecosystems for liquid tokens. Thirdly, the Penguins can have their cake and eat it too by using an interoperability protocol like LayerZero to later expand PENGU to Abstract when the time is right.
All that said, this token’s launch feels less like a pivot and more like a natural evolution—a growth spurt toward where the market’s energy currently lies, i.e. fungible fun tokens.
It'll be interesting to see how PENGU coalesces with the Pudgy Penguins NFTs, the wider Penguins brand vision, and Abstract over time. The true test will be whether the project can maintain its cultural momentum while navigating the complexities of multi-ecosystem expansions.
If successful, though, PENGU can definitely set a new blueprint for how NFT collections can leverage token economies to deepen engagement and broaden their reach in and beyond the cryptoeconomy. Keep an eye on this launch accordingly!
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