Viking Swap Exit

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Viking Swap

The anonymous Viking Swap team cloned another smart contract. They then made promises to investors that they'd buy back tokens, which they never did. There was no mechanism to hold them accountable, as they left the project with the development funds.

This is a global/international case not involving a specific country.

About Viking Swap

Viking Swap is "your go-to 2nd generation yield farm on the #bsc" and offers "[y]ield farms for the warriors of Valhalla on BSC!" "Viking swap was obviously a clone of Goose Finance, which in turn seemed to have taken most of its contract code from SushiSwap." "Hacken OÜ (Consultant) was contracted by Viking DeFi (Customer) to conduct a Smart Contract Code Review and Security Analysis."

"While GooseFinance was offering a LP with Million% APY, [Viking Swap] came up with a pool offering Billion% APY. They even got it listed on AutoFarm Network. I think this was the key reason why people decide to trust VikingSwap as many assumed that being listed on AutoFarm means it must be legit."

"March 7th, It was as usual as it gets on the Viking Swap telegram feed. Viking Token price was down %90 from its mouth-watering ATH of 73$. Members were talking about the new NFT burn model that has been said to be worked on by devs."

"As usual devs were nowhere to be seen on the channel. When asked about, moderator Enzee remarked that the devs “value their privacy”. Then in a few hours suddenly the telegram channel was locked and Viking Swap’s medium feed and telegram channel both displayed the same message titled “An Ode to Warriors” that announced devs have pulled the plug."

"So is this a rug pull? Not really, as the code was solid and none of the staker funds could be moved by the developers. They just took the developer fees that they and never did what what they promised with it, buying back VIKING tokens."

"That inevitably to lead to tanking of the VIKING price because all stakers sold their VIKING tokens to realize their “gains”. When the music stopped they shut down the shop and took the developer fees with them. So I think this is an exit scam. And it clearly shows stakers don’t have the knowledge to check if the devs are doing what they promised."

"They are the %4 deposit fees taken from Viking Swap Armory stakers, which they promised will be used to buyback VIKING tokens, which they never did. This wallet now holds 320K worth of EGG tokens, along with other tokens taken from armory deposit fees adding up to 1.2mil$ at the time of writing."

"So is this a rug pull? Not really, as the code was solid and none of the staker funds could be moved by the developers. They just took the developer fees that they and never did what what they promised with it, buying back VIKING tokens."

"We understand there has been huge damage done to our community. Some community members are trying to gather together to try to salvage what is left. We cannot make any promises at this time, but our intent is to look at what is available, what the options are, and whether portions of the project can be passed over from the devs to the community managers. Whilst we do not know yet what is possible, we will endeavour to do our best for you."

This is a global/international case not involving a specific country.

The background of the exchange platform, service, or individuals involved, as it would have been seen or understood at the time of the events.

Include:

Known history of when and how the service was started.
What problems does the company or service claim to solve?
What marketing materials were used by the firm or business?
Audits performed, and excerpts that may have been included.
Business registration documents shown (fake or legitimate).
How were people recruited to participate?
Public warnings and announcements prior to the event.

Don't Include:

Any wording which directly states or implies that the business is/was illegitimate, or that a vulnerability existed.
Anything that wasn't reasonably knowable at the time of the event.

There could be more than one section here. If the same platform is involved with multiple incidents, then it can be linked to a main article page.

The Reality

This sections is included if a case involved deception or information that was unknown at the time. Examples include:

When the service was actually started (if different than the "official story").
Who actually ran a service and their own personal history.
How the service was structured behind the scenes. (For example, there was no "trading bot".)
Details of what audits reported and how vulnerabilities were missed during auditing.

What Happened

The specific events of the loss and how it came about. What actually happened to cause the loss and some of the events leading up to it.

Key Event Timeline - Viking Swap Exit
Date	Event	Description
March 7th, 2021 12:00:00 AM	First Event	This is an expanded description of what happened and the impact. If multiple lines are necessary, add them here.

Total Amount Lost

The total amount lost is unknown.

How much was lost and how was it calculated? If there are conflicting reports, which are accurate and where does the discrepancy lie?

Immediate Reactions

How did the various parties involved (firm, platform, management, and/or affected individual(s)) deal with the events? Were services shut down? Were announcements made? Were groups formed?

Ultimate Outcome

What was the end result? Was any investigation done? Were any individuals prosecuted? Was there a lawsuit? Was any tracing done?

Total Amount Recovered

It is unknown how much was recovered.

What funds were recovered? What funds were reimbursed for those affected users?

Ongoing Developments

What parts of this case are still remaining to be concluded?

Prevention Policies

The viking swap token is most probably a security, since investors are paying money with the expectation of profit to be derived largely from the effort of a small group of people. The team is also anonymous.

Both of these are not generally able to happen in a regulated centralized exchange.