Squid Game Token: The Rug Pull You Couldn't Escape

Rose 75,000% in days. Investors literally could not sell. Then it went to zero in five minutes.

Squid Game Token

In October 2021, a token called SQUID appeared on Binance Smart Chain, riding the hype of the Netflix show Squid Game. It had no connection to the show. No license. No permission. Just a name and a Telegram group full of hype.

The token went vertical. From fractions of a cent to $2,861 in about a week. Media outlets covered it. CNBC mentioned it. CoinMarketCap tracked it. The chart was insane. There was just one problem: nobody could sell.

The developers had coded an "anti-dumping mechanism" into the smart contract. Buyers could purchase SQUID freely, but selling required holding a separate "Marble" token that was nearly impossible to obtain. Investors were trapped in a position they could only enter, never exit. The smart contract was a cage dressed up as an investment.

Then the developers pulled the liquidity. The price crashed from $2,861 to $0.0007 in five minutes flat. The devs walked away with an estimated $3.3 million. The Telegram group was deleted. The website went dark. The anonymous team was never identified.

The media cycle was brutal. CoinMarketCap was criticized for displaying the token without warning labels. CNBC was criticized for covering it. The argument was that media attention had legitimized a scam. The counterargument was that journalists report on things that are happening, not things they approve of. Either way, the coverage helped the devs by bringing in more buyers.

Blockchain forensics firm TRM Labs later linked the SQUID developers to at least two other rug pulls. The broader scheme totaled at least 35,025 BNB - roughly $19.3 million at the time - and TRM traced at least 2,693 ETH ($11.1 million) from SQUID-linked addresses to a single low-KYC exchange. But the clues were still insufficient to identify the people behind it. As of 2026, the developers remain anonymous and uncharged.

SQUID was a masterclass in the anatomy of a rug pull: ride trending cultural hype, lock investors in with clever contract mechanics, and drain the pool before anyone can react. The developers were never caught. $19 million across three scams and zero consequences.