Fogo cancels $20 million pre-sale, will airdrop tokens instead in upcoming mainnet launch

Fogo, an experimental Layer 1 blockchain built using the Solana Virtual Machine, is cancelling a previously announced token pre-sale ahead of its mainnet launch in January. Instead, the project now plans to airdrop the tokens rather than sell them.

Earlier this week, Fogo announced a $20 million token presale at a $1 billion fully diluted valuation, offering 2% of the FOGO token’s total supply. The aim was to help distribute the tokens to a wider audience, and targeted a relatively small capital raise to prioritize delivery over funding.

“The original goal of the presale was broad distribution to the current users and loyalists, but we determined there are better ways to do that while we focus on the launch of public mainnet,” Fogo Foundation Director Robert Sagurton told The Block in a direct message.

Fogo will now instead airdrop that 2% allocation, a project representative confirmed in a message to The Block. 

“Always read the room, sanity check original assumptions, and don’t hesitate to pivot when something no longer makes sense,” Sagurton added.

Fogo tokenomics

This is not the first change to Fogo’s economics. On Thursday, the team published its token allocation plan, with 6.6% earmarked for an airdrop that would immediately be tradeable. About a third of FOGO’s initial supply would also be unlocked to fund the Fogo Foundation, while core contributors would get 34% locked under a four-year vesting schedule. In total, 38.98% of tokens unlocked would be unlocked at network launch under this initial tokenomics plan. 

The project also named two “institutional investors,” Distributed Global and CMS Holdings, which would receive 8.77% of the total token supply. “Advisors” would also be rewarded 7%. 

Apart from the airdrop, 11.25% of the FOGO supply was broken out for “community ownership,” namely investors in the two crowdfunding sales conducted on Echo, the angel investor platform founded by popular crypto trader Jordan Fish, better known as Cobie, and now-cancelled Metaplex sales. 

“The Echo and upcoming Metaplex sales ensure community members hold a greater share than institutional investors,” the team wrote on X on Thursday. Some 3,200 investors participated in the Echo sales alone, including an $8 million raise at a $100 million valuation in January. (Full disclosure: The Block’s former CEO Larry Cermak was a participant via the Big Brain Collective.)

Moreover, ahead of the now-cancelled pre-sale, Fogo burned an additional 2% of the genesis supply initially set aside for core contributors. “It’s gone forever,” the Fogo rep said.

Airdrop, points, launch

With the planned Dec. 17 pre-sale canceled, Fogo points farmers could receive a larger allocation, the team suggested on X. “We have taken a snapshot of Fogo Fishers, Portal Bridge points holders, and all USDC transfers since the initial presale announcement. We will attribute Fogo Flames to these groups,” Fogo wrote. 

These groups refer to early adopters of the Fogo testnet, including its Fogo Fishing dApp and users who bridged USDC to Fogo via the Wormhole-powered Portal Bridge before the snapshot cutoff. Fogo Flames are points that will be redeemable for FOGO tokens after the Jan. 13 mainnet launch. 

“We value the strong, positive support received. Rest assured, we have taken note,” Fogo wrote. “The Fogo Flames points program remains a central pillar to give meaningful distribution to developers, community members and ecosystem participants.”

Sagurton, a former Jump Crypto executive, noted the canceled token sale represents a “doubling down on Flames,” and that the shifting strategy will not impact the Layer 1 launch.

Fogo is a next-gen blockchain built using the technological framework underpinning Solana. The project, developed by former Wall Street executives, aims to deliver 40-millisecond block times, support real-time trade execution, and reduce malicious MEV. A testnet was launched in July that now handles over 1,000 transactions per second. 

Notably, Fogo plans to be the first blockchain to implement Jump Crypto’s validator client software, which was launched on Friday. 

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