Fantom (FTM) Soars as Andre Cronje Makes a Surprise Return

Fantom (FTM) has experienced a dramatic price surge following news that Andre Cronje, the so-called "Godfather of DeFi," is making a comeback.

Update 05/11:

On November 5th, Andre Cronje posted a new meme on his Twitter account, suggesting that Fantom can scale on Layer 1 without the need for Layer 2 solutions, subnets, or sidechains like other blockchains.

pic.twitter.com/i0g1hrvWVn
— iamdefinitelyandre.ftm (@AndreCronjeTech) November 5, 2022

The price of FTM continued to rise following Andre Cronje's latest tweet.

1-hour Chart of FTM/USDT on Binance as of 12:10 AM on 05/11/2022

Original Post:

After a long hiatus since announcing his departure from the DeFi space in March 2022, Andre Cronje made a surprise return on the afternoon of November 3rd, hinting at a comeback and causing FTM’s price to spike.

Cronje, the chief architect behind Fantom (FTM) from 2018 to 2022, is also known for launching several DeFi projects that gained prominence in 2020, such as Yearn Finance (YFI), Keep3r Network (KP3R), and Multichain.xyz. At the time of his departure, Cronje was involved with up to 25 projects.

In late 2021, Cronje announced plans to develop a new DeFi protocol based on the ve(3,3) model for Fantom, called Solidly (SOLID). Solidly was expected to be a game-changer for Fantom, positioning it to compete with other Layer-1 blockchains. However, the project's launch in February 2022 faced multiple issues, leading to the collapse of the model and Cronje's decision to step away. Fantom’s TVL plummeted from over $8 billion in early March to just $4.5 billion within two weeks.

Cronje subsequently announced his departure from the DeFi sector, criticized the crypto community, and stated he would shift focus to legal affairs.

However, on November 3rd, Cronje returned to Twitter with a meme reading “Here we go again.”

pic.twitter.com/SJ0XrCkN8v
— iamdefinitelyandre.ftm (@AndreCronjeTech) November 3, 2022

He also updated his LinkedIn profile to "Vice President of Meme" at Fantom Foundation starting from November 2022.

I have no idea what this man is doing,
But I’m an ape,
And it’s ape szn. pic.twitter.com/7mzSg4Ek93
— Tree of Alpha (@Tree_of_Alpha) November 3, 2022

See also: Andre Cronje Crypto

The immediate reaction saw a significant uptick in the prices of cryptocurrencies associated with Cronje, such as FTM, KP3R, and SOLID, with FTM soaring over 25%.

1-hour Chart of FTM/USDT on Binance as of 06:10 PM on 03/11/2022

1-hour Chart of KP3R/USDT on Binance as of 06:10 PM on 03/11/2022

SOLID Price Movement Over the Last 24 Days, Data from CoinMarketCap as of 06:10 PM on 03/11/2022

Daily active addresses on Fantom have also surged back above 800,000, according to Nansen.

Additionally, Andre Cronje has changed his Twitter handle to “iamdefinitelyandre.ftm” to promote Fantom Domains, a domain project on Fantom similar to Ethereum Name Service.

It remains to be seen whether Andre Cronje has truly returned or if his controversial Twitter account has been hacked.