Outside Source
Journalist
Hassan Shittu
Journalist
Hassan Shittu
ZKJ token holders watched $500 million evaporate in minutes during a coordinated liquidity attack on June 15, but Polyhedra has just launched its Phoenix Revival Program to reward the survivors.
The program targets stakeholders who held through the 90% crash, offering early access to ecosystem airdrops and zero-knowledge infrastructure rewards.
Community backlash erupted immediately, with investors calling the initiative a betrayal after the leadership abandoned promised buybacks for vague future perks instead of addressing the financial carnage.
According to an X post from Polyhedra, the Phoenix Revival Program targets users who had staked ZKJ tokens on-chain via Ethereum or Binance Smart Chain as of 13:00 UTC on June 15.
Eligibility and reward allocation will be based on each user’s staking power at that exact moment. This approach, according to Polyhedra, recognizes loyalty and long-term participation rather than short-term speculation.
Through the program, eligible users will also gain access to incentives tied to future Polyhedra products and whitelist placement for upcoming ecosystem airdrops.
While the platform did not provide an exact timeline for rewards, it confirmed that these benefits would be integrated into multiple ongoing and future product rollouts, such as ZKML—a zero-knowledge and AI hybrid verification tool, a zkSNARK-based privacy stablecoin, the zero-knowledge decentralized exchange “Dark Pool,” and EXPchain, a zk-native Layer-1 blockchain with live testnet and forthcoming cross-chain functionality.
However, the community’s reaction to Polyhedra’s Phoenix Revival Program was negative because the plan omitted any reference to a buyback commitment previously promised by the project’s leadership.
Many viewed it as a betrayal of trust and an indication that the team was retreating from financial responsibility.
Instead of directly addressing the damage caused by the crash, which had wiped out over 90% of ZKJ’s market value and left many investors deep in the red, the team focused its recovery plan on future access to new product features and airdrops.
This forward-looking approach failed to satisfy many stakeholders who were still grappling with immediate losses.
A sense of abandonment pervaded community discussions, with users expressing frustration that Polyhedra appeared more concerned with salvaging its roadmap and image than compensating those who had lost substantial funds.
Adding to the frustration, community members noted that the planned staking incentives and ecosystem benefits were only useful if the project and its token regained value, something many now doubted.
As of press time, the token was trading at $0.1962, down 6.25% on the day and 82.65% over the past year. Since its peak at $4.01 in March 2024, ZKJ has lost more than 94% of its value.
ZKJ Token Crashed 90% Due to Liquidity Drain
On June 15, the ZKJ token from Polyhedra experienced a severe collapse, plunging from $2 to below $0.35 in under two hours.
The collapse began with a $4.3 million liquidity withdrawal from PancakeSwap by a single wallet, followed by the rapid sale of 1.5 million ZKJ tokens.
Around the same time, a Wintermute-linked wallet deposited additional ZKJ into exchanges, sparking further sell-offs. Bybit recorded over $97 million in long position liquidations within two hours.
In response, Polyhedra injected $30 million worth of stablecoins into its DEX pools and announced a temporary buyback.
However, this failed to stabilize the market, and skepticism quickly mounted when on-chain researchers discovered that wallets linked to the team may have been involved in draining the KOGE/USDT liquidity pool, used prominently in Binance’s Alpha Points program.
These wallets later swapped KOGE for ZKJ and dumped large amounts into the open market, raising concerns of a coordinated exit.
Although Polyhedra denied any direct involvement, the community remained unconvinced.
This article first appeared at News
