Aster's CEO dismisses insider trading remarks as CZ FUD spreads

The allegations and blame piling on ex-Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao over the past two weeks have now spread to Aster, but the exchange’s chief executive says the FUD is all unfair.

In a lengthy statement published early Tuesday on X, decentralized and perpetual crypto exchange Aster CEO Leonard replied to the accusations leveled against the platform and its collaboration with CZ. 

Some members of the crypto community are holding onto claims that Zhao pumped and dumped coins during Aster’s market debut days, a rumor Cryptopolitan debunked in October.

“There are some allegations swirling around regarding Aster and the team that are simply factually incorrect. These accusations are made without any evidence to deliberately sway public opinion with malicious intent,” Leonard said, trying to cool the angry community over Aster token’s bleak price performance. 

Aster CEO acknowledges community frustration over token price slump

Leonard opened his message by saying the team understood holders’ frustration and was working to improve the situation, inviting feedback from investors in the project’s Discord channel. He argued that short-term price swings are difficult to forecast, but long-term valuation depends on the project’s real output and how its token model distributes value. 

“We believe the long-term price should gravitate towards the token’s intrinsic value, and we are working on both and will be addressing both later in the thread,” he wrote.

The statement is the first ever comprehensive response from Aster’s leadership since criticism over Zhao’s advisory role in the crypto trading platform. Leonard stressed that Zhao is only a consultant and Aster operates independently. He added that Yzi Labs, which he admitted is an investor in the project, holds its allocation under long-term lockup conditions.

Leonard rejected the assertion that the exchange was created to serve as an exit liquidity for insiders like CZ. He insisted that those claims lacked evidence and misrepresented how the project functions.

In his discussion of tokenomics, the CEO of the exchange said that the token emissions and buyback programs of the token follow a set of publicly disclosed rules. According to Leonard, the token mechanisms are intended for rewarding liquidity providers, traders, and long-term holders, but not for token sales or profit-taking.

He said the project recently updated its buyback system to automate daily repurchases using trading fees generated on the platform. Those transactions, he noted, are visible on-chain and can be tracked through community dashboards.

“We have recently updated our buyback mechanism to make the buybacks more predictable and independent by enabling on-chain daily buyback programs that execute automatically from fees generated,” the DEX founder announced.

Token burn executed to boost prices, CEO argues

Leonard detailed that Aster had repurchased 254 million tokens, burned 78 million, and reallocated another 78 million to airdrop reserves, thereby lowering both the total and circulating supply. The remaining repurchased tokens, he continued explaining, are slated for future burns.

The exchange is also working on user experience improvements, including a redesigned interface and faster loading speeds. On the token side, Leonard said the current trading airdrop campaign, labeled S6, would be the final one. Moreover, he stated that automatic buybacks will continue, using up to 80% of fees collected during S6. 

“We stand by our product, and are happy to provide on-chain proofs, audits, or discuss specifics with analysts/community. Let’s judge by execution, not speculation. We are grateful to our supporters that chose to build with us for the long term,” Leonard concluded his statement.

Aster’s token showed signs of short-term recovery following the statement and recent buyback activity. According to Coingecko data, ASTER rose 6.11% over the past 24 hours, trying to fend off a 9% drop over the previous week and a 21% drop in the past month.

Last Sunday, AsterDex activated a Strategic Reserve Buyback Fund to repurchase 2.9 million ASTER, valued at $1.6 million. The latest purchase added to cumulative buybacks totaling 248 million ASTER, valued at about $137 million since last October. 

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