The Rise and Fall of CRO Token: A Controversial History of Crypto Assets Development

In the field of Crypto Assets, a recent proposal put forward by the Cronos chain has sparked widespread controversy. The proposal suggests the reminting of 70 billion CRO Tokens, which is equivalent to 3.3333 times the current circulation. This move is essentially aimed at restoring the 70% CRO Tokens that were destroyed in 2021.

Once this proposal was announced, it immediately sparked strong reactions and doubts within the community. Despite facing numerous criticisms from community members and industry opinion leaders, the management team of the Cronos chain remains steadfast in their views. In subsequent public communications and media interviews, they even stated: "Trust us, or sell your Tokens," a stance that further intensified the controversy.

The abnormal situations that occurred during the voting process are even more striking. Just before the voting was about to end, suddenly 3.35 billion CRO surged into the voting pool, all cast in favor. There are reports that these Tokens may come from nodes controlled by the project party, which hold nearly 70%-80% of the voting rights. This operation has raised questions about the fairness of the voting.

For experienced Crypto Assets practitioners, this operation by CRO, although unpleasant, is not entirely unexpected. Looking back at its development history, we can see that this is not the first event to provoke community backlash.

CRO's predecessor was MONACO (MCO), a well-established project that started its ICO in 2017, focusing on crypto payment card services. In 2018, the project underwent a rebranding, changing its name to Crypto.com and issuing a new token, CRO. In August 2020, the project team announced the integration of the MCO token into the CRO system, a decision that sparked strong reactions from the community at the time.

In February 2021, the project team announced that in order to promote decentralized governance and support the development of the Cronos chain, they decided to destroy 70% of the tokens. However, just four years later, they proposed to remint these destroyed tokens, citing the reason of supporting the development of ETFs.

Even more perplexingly, on the day after the 70 billion CRO re-minting proposal was passed, the Cronos team proposed a new plan to destroy 50 million CRO. The true intention behind this move is difficult to grasp, leaving one to wonder whether it is to appease the community's anger or if there is a deeper meaning.

This series of events has sparked deep reflections on the essence of blockchain and the integrity of crypto assets projects. If tokens that have already been destroyed can be easily re-minted, how can the immutability of blockchain technology and the concept of decentralization be demonstrated? This is undoubtedly a question that the entire crypto assets industry needs to seriously consider and address.