Kinto is the modular exchange. Access the best opportunities in DeFi through our tailored blockchain and non-custodial smart wallet, engineered for maximum security and seamless user experience.

TL;DR

• We’re back. $K is trading above $5, roughly the weekly average before the hack.
• CEX ticker. To avoid future disputes, CEXs are migrating from $K → $KINTO; we’ll use $KINTO on CEXs going forward.
• Liquidity boost. A new market-maker goes live Aug 18th to deepen CEX order books.
• Repayments. Custom contracts open soon; borrowers have until Nov 15th to repay USDC and unlock collateral— with early-repay bonuses up to 10%. Lenders receive distributions Nov 15th. Team will work to cover the ~$700k hack gap; any shortfall is topped up in Kinto tokens.
• Staking schedule. Season 2 end moves to Aug 31st; Arbitrum airdrop Aug 18th; Season 3(with ERA airdrop) starts Sept 1st.
• Incident update. Hacker stole 577 ETH (~$2.3M); 500 ETH mixed via Tornado; 77.1 ETH remains at 0xCe2e…b776.
• Phoenix NFT badge will be minted for holders/stakers at the time of the hack.
• Next. “Kinto v2” roadmap: mobile app, more chains, more functionality.

The last few weeks have been trying to say the least. The proxy exploit that affected EVM block explorers and proxy contracts hardened our resolve. Kinto network and wallets were not affected by the hack. A hacked that showed how security is paramount for integrating DeFi and traditional finance. Kinto stands as the only L2 rollup with decentralized KYC & AML that can bridge the transition.

🐦‍🔥Phoenix Relaunch wasn’t just a fundraise; it was a test of conviction. You showed up, we rebuilt, and together we pushed the market back to pre-hack levels.

This post recaps where we are, what’s next, and how we’ll make Morpho & Royco lenders whole.

1) Trading Is Back — and So Are We 🕊️

After the exploit and migration, the initial volatility was to be expected. After a couple days, the token price has stabilized above $5, inline with the weekly average before the hack.

That rebound belongs to the community — holders who didn’t panic, lenders who extended lifelines, and partners who kept faith.

New Ticker, Same Mission

To eliminate symbol conflicts and avoid repeat drama, we’ve moved from $K → $KINTO on centralized exchanges.

Expect all CEX listings to converge on $KINTO over the following weeks.

On-chain contracts and fundamentals are unchanged.

2) Bolstering Liquidity 💧

Relists are fragile without depth. We’ve signed with a new market maker (without a token loan) to tighten spreads, reduce slippage, and smooth volatility across CEXs

This enhanced liquidity is expected to go live on Aug 18th, 2025.

We’ll publish public market-quality stats via forgd so you can track the impact.

3) Next Step — Morpho & Royco Repayment 🛠️

We owe lenders clarity and speed. We’re deploying custom repayment contracts on Kinto L2 and Arbitrum end of next week.

This lets original borrowers repay USDC directly, unlock their $KINTO smoothly, and creates an auditable trail for distributions.

How it works:

• If you borrowed: repay your USDC at any time before the deadline; your locked $KINTO unlocks automatically. To encourage quick action, bonuses scale with time — repay earlier, earn more (up to 10%).
• If you lent: you’ll receive the repaid USDC (plus team top-ups) pro-rata after the window closes. If — after team top-ups — there’s still a gap, we’ll distribute Kinto tokens to cover the shortfall + interest. We will also create a custom contract on Arbitrum in collaboration with Royco to repay their lenders on Nov 15th.

Why this structure?
It aligns incentives: quick borrower repayments speed lender recovery; transparent contracts make the process deterministic; and using Kinto tokens for any residual gap avoids leaving lenders in limbo.

A dedicated page with contract links, FAQs, and a live progress bar will go up end of next week.

4) Staking Season Adjustments ✈️

We diverted all of our resources to the migration, relist, and exchange coordination.

Rather than rush distributions, we’re giving stakers clear dates and a smoother pipeline to distribute the promised airdrops.

What this means for you:

• Season 2 runs a bit longer so every eligible wallet receives the airdrops that were originally planned.
• ARB airdrop moved to August 18th so we can net out balances post-migration.
• Season 3 starts fresh, and includes the promised ERA airdrop on October 15th.

Updated schedule

• ARB airdrop will now happen on August 18th instead of July 31st.
• Another Airdrop will be delivered on August 30th.
• Extended all staking seasons deadlines by two weeks. Season Two will now unlock on August 31st.

As always, we’ll post per-wallet spreadsheets before each drop so there are no surprises.

5) Stolen Funds Update 🕵️

The attacker moved 577 ETH (≈ $2.2M). 500 ETH was routed through Tornado; 77.1 ETH remains at 0xCe2e989637A837eC58527C1Ca6170cc16cE0b776.

We’re working with ZeroShadow and authorities to pursue every viable recovery path.

If you spot relevant flows or intel, DM the core team or open a ticket on Discord—tips are welcome.

We’ll offer a bounty of up to 15% for any verified tips with new information that lead to recovery.

6) A Thank-You That Lives On 🐦‍🔥

The community’s composure carried us. To commemorate that, every wallet that held or staked tokens at the time of the hack will receive a Phoenix NFT Badge later this month.

It’s a memento of grit; they will be airdropped directly to eligible Kinto wallets.

7) The Road Ahead — Kinto v2 ⛩️

Rebuilding forced us to harden the stack. Now we’re pushing ahead:

• Mobile App — non-custodial, biometric sign-in, gas-abstracted flows.
• More Chains — native support for Solana, Bitcoin and more.
• Institutional Vaults with DeFi Yield— institutional-grade risk controls and reporting.

From ashes to architecture: we’re rebuilding stronger than before. We’ll publish a new blogpost about Kinto v2 in the following weeks.

Join us as we turn resilience into momentum — and momentum into the golden road to intuitive, compliant DeFi.

Onward. ⛩️

🔗 Create an account | 🌐 Website | 📚Docs | Twitter | Discord

🐦‍🔥 Kinto Phoenix Rises — Next Steps was originally published in Kinto on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Kinto is the modular exchange. Access the best opportunities in DeFi through our tailored blockchain and non-custodial smart wallet, engineered for maximum security and seamless user experience.

TL;DR

• Trading resumes Aug 6th 2025 · 12:00 PM JST (03:00 UTC) at $7.48
• Trading Venues: Gate • MEXC • BingX • Biconomy • Kinto • Uniswap
• New $K Token Contract on Arbitrum 0x6ba19eE69D5dDe3aB70185C801fA404F66fEdB58 (no proxy)
• All balances pre-hack are migrated 1:1 as they were at block 356170028 on Arbitrum and on Kinto.
• 60,000 extra $K tokens will be minted to post-hack buyers that purchased $K after the hack on CEXs and/or Kinto.
• The fate of this relaunch rests on the community’s hands. We need your support to make Kinto’s comeback a reality.

1. A 30-second recap 🔍

On July 9th a rogue storage-slot exploit let an attacker mint unlimited $K on Arbitrum, drain liquidity and steal > $2 M.

Within two weeks we:

• Raised $1.2 M (Phoenix round + Wildcat credit line)
• Shipped a new proxy-free token contract on Arbitrum
• Coordinated all major exchanges for a synchronized relisting and migration process.

Full technicals → post-mortem here.

2. Relisting details 📅

Time: Aug 2025 · 12:00 PM JST (03:00 UTC)

Starting Price: $7.48

Gate confirmation → announcement
MEXC confirmation → announcement

Gate, MEXC, BingX, Biconomy, Kinto L2 and Uniswap all follow the same schedule.

Deposits & withdrawals on Kinto will be enabled at the same time.

Swapping on Kinto will be enabled a few hours later once 0x API picks up the Uniswap pool.

Kraken will enable deposits/withdrawals of the new asset once balances migrate.

3. Distribution & Migration mechanics ⚙️

First, why the rollback can never be perfect.

When the attacker minted unlimited $K they immediately swapped the fake tokens into USDT, ETH and other assets, siphoning ≈ $2 M out of the ecosystem. Those swaps touched CEX books, DEX pools and cross-chain bridges — value that can’t be “rewound.”

Worse, the hacker’s mint exceeded the entire real circulating supply, so untangling which post-hack trades involved genuine community members vs. phantom coins is mathematically impossible.

We’ve chosen the only fair, auditable compromise:

1. Pre-hack balances (snapshot) → receive 1:1 new $K whether you sold after or not.
2. Post-hack buyers (fake-minted supply) → project is minting 60,000 extra $K to compensate buyers on CEXs and Kinto, priced at the pre-hack TWAP $7.48. Only buyers on these venues who purchased in the first two hours after the hack will receive these tokens.
   Yes, that’s an additional burden for us — but it’s the fair thing to do
3. Distribution of new tokens on CEXs are happening as we speak. On-chain distribution on Kinto is completed. Distribution on Arbitrum will be completed just a few minutes before trading restarts to avoid the creation of Uniswap pools with no liquidity.
4. Total Supply and breakdown stays the same in the new token. All new minted tokens come from the tokens that were bought back and are fully unlocked.

Note: Despite what some influencers mistakenly shared on Twitter, there has never been no unlock of team/investor tokens.

The team and investors have never sold a single token and we are both fully locked until April 1st 2026. The tokens sit on this contract and no vesting token has ever moved.

Vesting schedules and circulating-supply tables on CoinGecko / CMC / CoinRank are updated to avoid further misunderstandings.

📚 Tokenomics: https://docs.kinto.xyz/kinto-the-modular-exchange/governance/kinto-token

4. Why the next 72 h matter ⛩

During the first listing (March) 15 % of supply hit the market at once — then tariffs, FUD and months of brutal buy-backs.

We had to work in extremely difficult conditions since March to claw ourselves back from $2.10 → +$8 … and then the exploit struck.

We get one more shot:

• If $K holds ≥ $4, Morpho & Royco suppliers can be made whole and the roadmap stays intact.
• Below that, treasury is dry; fundraising becomes unavailable.

Neither the team nor early investors have sold a single token. Zero insider unlocks have happened.

Our fate is literally in the community’s hands — yours.

5. The last stand 🛡

We’ve been through a gauntlet.

• March listing: 12.5 % of supply — 10 % airdrop + 2.5 % ICO — fully unlocked at TGE on the very day U.S. tariff fears tanked the market. Accusations of “insider dumps” flew, yet no team wallet has ever sold a single token.

• July black swan: just as $K clawed from $2.50 to $7.80, a once-in-a-decade proxy exploit on Arbitrum vaporized $2M of liquidity and forced an emergency migration.

• Today: we’ve listed twice, coordinated six venues, raised $1M in debt financing, and still minted 60,000 extra $K to protect post-hack buyers — knowing most of it may hit the ask in a market far colder than three weeks ago.

Yet we’re still here, because we believe Kinto is the only L2 that marries KYC/AML compliance and true decentralisation — no user PII, stage-1 decentralization and real custom logic. If (or when) the FIT/Clarity Act passes, we expect that hard regulatory work to flip from headwind to tail-wind.

This relist is our last stand. If $K stays above $4, Morpho suppliers recover, debt is repaid, fundraising becomes possible and the roadmap lives.

If not, there are no more rabbits to pull from the hat.

The choice — support or sell — is entirely yours.

6. How you can help 🙌

1. Spread the word — share this article, retweet the listing announcements.
2. Keep calm — rational price action once volatility subsides, ↑ recovery odds for everyone.

We did the impossible once; we’re trying to do it again. Let’s make Kinto the biggest comeback story.

Thank you to Phoenix lenders on Wildcat, TAC Coalition, Arbitrum Foundation, Jill Gunter, Dialectic and every holder who refused to give up.

See you on the other side ⛩️

🔥 $K Phoenix Relaunch —Relisting was originally published in Kinto on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

TL;DR

• A previously unknown back-door technique let an attacker smuggle a “hacker-proxy” into thousands of ERC-1967 proxy contracts across EVM chains.
• On 9 July 2025, 20:17 UTC the attacker upgraded the Arbitrum $K token proxy, minted unlimited $K and drained all available liquidity from Uniswap V4 and our Morpho Blue vault (~ $1.55 M) X (formerly Twitter).
• Kinto’s L2, wallet SDK, and chain-abstraction layer were never touched. A third-party ERC1967 Proxy and EVM Block explorers(a 10-year-old, repeatedly-audited codebase we did not write) were affected.
• We have frozen CEX trading, pulled remaining liquidity, and are collaborating with ZeroShadow and other investigators X (formerly Twitter).
• Unless the attacker returns control, we will deploy a new $K contract, restore every balance to the pre-hack block 356170028, and relaunch trading at the pre-hack price.

What actually happened?

🚪 The back-door

Security researchers at Venn / DEEB & friends discovered that if a proxy fails to initialise the EIP-1967 implementation slot, a second implementation can be written into the same storage page but at a different offset.

Explorers happily showed the legit implementation while the hidden one lay dormant.

When ready, the attacker simply flipped the pointer, seized owner rights and upgraded the contract again to a malicious minter.

🐛 Why $K on Arbitrum was affected?

Our Arbitrum token used an off-the-shelf transparent-proxy ERC-20 pattern. That contract inherited the latent bug.

The code was taking directly from OpenZeppelin libraries which have been used for many years and audited many times.

No code running on Kinto L2 or written by the Kinto core team was involved.

🕐 Detailed timeline (UTC)

• Wed · 9 Jul 2025 · 20:17 — First public disclosure of the proxy-slot back-door by @deeberiroz.
• Thu · 10 Jul 2025 · 08:40 — Attacker upgrades the Arbitrum $K proxy, mints unlimited tokens, and drains Uniswap & Morpho (~ $1.55 M). See the Tenderly trace and the attacker’s tx list.
• Thu · 10 Jul 2025 · 09:50 — Kinto issues its first public alert.
• Thu · 10 Jul 2025 · 16:18 — Venn acknowledges some teams (e.g., Berachain) were warned while Kinto was missed — statement.
• Thu · 10 Jul 2025 · 21:44 — Full incident thread & preliminary post-mortem by @ramonrecuero.
• Fri · 11 Jul 2025 · 16:03 — ZeroShadow begins on-chain tracing and recovery coordination — update.
• Sat · 12 Jul 2025 · 19:22 — Deep dive on storage-slot abuse published by @pcaversaccio.

Impact
Direct loss: $1.55 M (Uniswap + Morpho USDC)

Price impact: > 95 % draw-down (> $10 M Market capevaporated)

Morpho suppliers are owed $3.2 M; borrowers hold $2.4 M in loans with liquidation prices ≥ $3, so repayment incentives remain.

🛡 What wasn’t affected

• Kinto L2 smart-contracts, bridge, and sequencer
• Wallet SDK & account-abstraction infrastructure
• User deposits/withdrawals of any asset except $K on Kinto
  All continue to operate normally.

⛩ The path forward

1. Token migration — deploy a fresh, hardened $K implementation on Arbitrum.
2. Balance restoration — snapshot the last clean block and restore all on-chain and CEX balances (BingX, Gate, MEXC, Biconomy).
3. Liquidity reboot — raise a small recovery round, seed a new Uniswap pool, and reopen CEX books at the pre-hack price. (Block: 356170028)
4. Morpho remediation.

• Give borrowers 90 days to repay, enabling suppliers to recover ~ 85 % in that window which was roughly the lock on the Royco market.
• Cover any residual shortfall with team funds / newly-issued $K or USDC.

5. Speculator fairness window — one week after trading resumes, wallets that bought the dip before our first announcement will receive new $K pro-rata. Details TBD.

How you can help ❤️

We’re shouldering this hit, but rebooting markets requires capital and we are putting together a really small raise to restore the market.

If you believe in Kinto’s vision for a safer, compliant yet decentralized DeFi, please consider reaching out to us on Twitter/Discord.

Every contribution goes straight into liquidity and victim restitution.

Closing words

We are deeply sorry for the turbulence this has caused. Despite the fact that the vulnerability lay in third-party proxy code and EVM block explorers, responsibility ultimately rests with us to safeguard everything that affects the Kinto ecosystem.

We’re moving fast — but prudently — to restore trust, value, and momentum.

Thank you for standing with us 🙏

🔗 Create an account | 🌐 Website | 📚Docs | Twitter | Discord

⛩️ Post-Mortem — $K Proxy Hack & Our Path Forward was originally published in Kinto on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Kinto’s cherry blossoms have fallen, the hot-spring steam has drifted away, and summer sun now blankets the Modular Exchange.

Today we’re launching Natsu, our fourth seasonal campaign, focused on super-charging the new Morpho Vault, $K staking, and perps trading.

The season is already live and runs until September 15 (23:59 UTC).

TL;DR

• Three-month season. ☀️ Natsu runs from now through Sept 15.
• Base mining rewards revert to normal (no Sakura double-boost).
• Stake $K → 25 % APY + 50 % mining bonus.
• Supply USDC in the Morpho Vault → up to 25 % blended APY (10 % in USDC + 15 % in $K).
• Perps volume now scales with staked $K. Earn 1 $K per $3,000 traded.
• Referral program extended. Bring a friend; if they deposit ≥ $1 000, you both earn 1 $K.
• Everything stacks. Stake, trade, lend, and refer simultaneously to multiply rewards.

Seasons of Growth

Momiji 🍁 brought first-time users.

Onsen ❄️ deepened liquidity.

Sakura 🌸 doubled rewards ahead of the $K listing.

With Natsu 🌞 we turn that momentum into awareness and volume.

Natsu (夏): Summer in Kinto

Natsu (夏) means summer. It’s the season of matsuri, fire-work lit nights, and relentless growth in the rice fields.

Just as the fields soak up sunlight, Kinto users will harvest higher real yields all summer long. Act before the cicadas fall silent.

⛩️ Natsu Heats Up Kinto

Starting today, all activity earns standard Mining Program rewards — and Natsu-specific boosts layered on top.

1️⃣ Stake $K — Earn More of Everything

• 25 % base APY (paid in $K).
• Additional +50 % mining bonus for every staked $K during Natsu.
• Staked balance also unlocks better Hyperliquid exchange rates (see below).

2️⃣ Morpho Vault — 25 % Yield for USDC LPs

Last month, we turned $K into productive DeFi collateral via Morpho Blue on Arbitrum. Borrowers can post $K as collateral at up to 40 % LTV, enabling safe leverage or runway financing.

Supply USDC into the new $K market for the whole season and earn:

• 10 % fixed USDC yield — variable yield paid per block, remainder paid end of season.
• 15 % streaming $K incentives — paid daily

Combined target ≈ 25 % APY. | Available only to deposits before Sept 15.

3️⃣ Trade Perps — Boosted by Your Stake

Hyperliquid trading rewards now scale with commitment to the network:

Lower thresholds = faster stacking of $K.

Fees remain 5 bps with tiered discounts.

4️⃣ Bring Your Friends, Get Rewarded

Our referral program continues:

• For every new Kinto user you refer who deposits ≥ $1 000 and keeps it during the campaign, stakes ≥ 10 $K, or trades ≥ $10 000 in perps, you both receive 1 $K.

No cap. Grow the village, grow your stack.

⏳ Don’t Miss It

The heat won’t last forever. Natsu ends on September 15. When autumn leaves start falling, today’s APYs and staking boosts will be gone.

Ready to earn, trade, and build with the Modular Exchange?

👉 kinto.xyz

🌐 Website | 📚Docs | Twitter | Discord

We’re building an on-chain financial system that’s safer, faster, and open to all. Join us on the Golden Road.

Nothing in this post is financial advice. Rewards, APYs, and program parameters may change by governance vote or market conditions.

☀️ Summer Season — Natsu (夏) was originally published in Kinto on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Kinto is the modular exchange. Access the best opportunities in DeFi through our tailored blockchain and non-custodial smart wallet, engineered for maximum security and seamless user experience.

TL;DR

• Season 1 complete — 350K tokens locked
• $150 000 in USDC rewards now claimable.
• Claiming opens three on-chain governance proposals (links below).
• Season 2 vault live — 3 / 6 / 9-month locks with 25 % APY in K
• Instant bonus for long-terms stakers.
• All stakers will receive at least 3 airdrops next quarter.
• Your stake = your vote; your patience = your share of future upside.

Since listing, the team has been building non-stops to build momentum. Six weeks ago the K-Economy shed inflation forever and extended the locks of the team and investors with K Reloaded. This week $K became DeFi collateral.

Today, we turn back to the people who backed us through April’s chaos and invite them to shape what comes next.

🔢 Season One by the numbers

During this period, we also launched buy-backs (2 000 K/day), tweaked the tokenomics and awarded extra 25% tokens to ICO participants.

*Note: Extra staked tokens awarded to ICO participants unlock on June 30th.

🗳 Claim & vote — the three proposals

The moment you claim your Season 1 rewards you’ll be prompted to vote on three important governance proposals onchain:

1. 👥 Nio Council elections
   Document | Tally
   Ratify the decision to run the Nio elections before the end of the year.
2. 💸 Buy-backs
   Document | Tally
   Decide whether to continue the buybacks until Nios are elected.
3. ⚙️ Market-maker clawback
   Document | Tally
   Vote to recall the +20,000 K loaned to for failing KPIs and cancel mining rewards awarded.

Polls remain open until May 29th. Voting power is proportional to your $K tokens you held in your wallet.

⚙️ Season Two mechanics

• APY: 25% paid in $K at the end of the season (Aug 15th)
• 3 Airdrops worth at least $100,000
• +25% Bonus in the mining program
• Long-term Boost
  9% for people that stake for 9 months and 4% for 6 months. This is added immediately so it compounds returns.

All rewards are funded from buy-backs & treasury, not new emissions — so longer locks reduce circulating supply while you accrue more K.

📖 How to join Season 2

1. Visit engen.kinto.xyz/explore/k
2. Delegate & Vote on the proposals
3. Pick 3 / 6 / 9-month lock
4. Approve & send the tx gas-free
5. Monitor bonus & APY in real time

🛣️ Roadmap snapshot

• By end of May — Tier-1 CEX listing announcement.
• June— Add support for +100 spot assets.
• Q3 — Mobile App and Kinto V2.
• Q4 — Nio elections, Prediction Markets.

Every milestone compounds volume or revenue, feeding back into staking yield and buy-back heft.

🌸 Why restake?

We navigated the worst launch window imaginable, built non-stop, and tripled price without minting a single new token.

Time is now the scarcest ingredient. By locking for 6- or 9-months you:

• Remove sell pressure exactly when we open new liquidity venues.
• Earn higher real yield (+4 % / +9 % upfront).
• Receive multiple airdrops from partners building on Kinto.
• Hold a direct vote on protocol economics.

If you share that long-term vision, roll your stake. If you need liquidity, claim and borrow against your K or walk free.

Sakura rewards patient gardeners.

🌸 Sakura trusts the whole tree to flower; give it a season and watch it bloom.

🔗 Create an account | 🌐 Website | 📚Docs | Twitter | Discord

TLDR

• $K is now DeFi collateral.
• Supply your tokens, unlock up to 40 % LTV in USDC loans.
• Supplying USDC earns a combined ~20 % APY.
• $K market becomes the first Morpho market on Arbitrum.
• Morpho pre-liquidations auto-deleverage risky positions.

In March we outlined the $K Economy and, in April, tightened the screws with Reloaded tokenomics, removing inflation, extending locks, and cementing $K’s scarcity. The next logical step is to make $K productive— to let holders unlock working capital while reinforcing the network capacity and DeFi features.

Today we’re doing exactly that: $K can now be posted as collateral on Kinto through Morpho Blue, institutional-grade lending protocol.

The integration is now live and turns a formerly passive governance token into productive balance-sheet capital.

The missing piece was utility. Today it arrives.

Why Lending Matters for $K

A programmable governance token that just sits in wallets is untapped potential. By opening a USDC market against $K we:

• Increase capital efficiency for builders and long-term holders. You can borrow stables without selling governance power or exposure.
• Establish a risk-off on-chain yield source. Savers earn real USDC plus $K incentives instead of farming mercenary emissions.
• Create a reflexive safety loop. More locked $K raises scarcity; deeper liquidity raises confidence; confidence drives new deposits.
• Enables Responsible Leverage. $K holders can also lever their collateral by using the borrowings to purchase more $K. Pre-liquidations and capped LTV automatically de-lever the risk positions.

Why we chose Morpho Blue

Morpho is the second-largest lending primitive on Ethereum after Aave, topping $2B in cumulative deposits with zero insolvency events and multiple security audits. Their latest architecture — Blue — introduces:

• One-sided risk pools. Each pair ($K / USDC) is siloed. No contagion from other assets.
• Pre-liquidations. When an LTV approaches the threshold, third-party bots gradually unwind the debt at a discount, avoiding the 100 % “cliff” auctions that wreck prices elsewhere.
• Gas-optimized accounting. Up to 40 % cheaper than legacy lending protocols, which matters on L2 and really matters on mainnet.

Simply put, Morpho brings CEX-grade efficiency to non-custodial lending while preserving the permissionless ethos that Kinto was founded on.

Risk Parameters at Launch

• Max LTV: 40 % (through Kinto UI)
• Liquidation LTV: 62.5 %
• Preliquidation LTV: 55%
• Oracle: Pyth K/USD

These numbers will be revisited by governance once we have a few weeks of on-chain data.

How It Works

Morpho enables a few different workflows.

1. Post $K → Borrow USDC

1. Deposit $K in the lending vault.
2. Borrow up to 40 % LTV in USDC at an initial variable rate around 2 % APY.
3. Liquidity parameters are guarded by Morpho’s pre-liquidation engine. When a position touches 40 % LTV, professional keepers automatically de-risk it in small increments — no cliff auctions, no cascading wicks.

2. Supply USDC → Earn Yield (25% APY at launch)

USDC suppliers receive the base lending rate plus streaming $K incentives that target a combined ~20 % APY at launch.

Rewards are paid weekly in proportion to supplied USDC. Early liquidity providers capture the widest spreads.

👉 Head to the $K page to get started.

🌸 Compounding opportunities during Sakura

Kinto was designed as a safety-first Layer 2 where real-world institutions can meet DeFi without compromise. Productive collateral is the missing link between scarcity and utility. Starting next week you can spend $K without selling $K — and you can earn on stables without leaving the K-Economy.

1 $K for every $500 lent per month.

Plus all the active Sakura rewards:

• 1.5x mining rewards across all activity during Sakura 🌸
• 1 $K for every $500 deposit, $25K traded, or 10 $K staked — and your friend gets rewarded too
• 50% extra mining rewards when staking $K in the Kinto Vault

Sakura doesn’t bloom twice, but capital does. 🌸

👉 Read more about the Sakura campaign here

What’s Next

• New Staking Season: extra incentive for users who stake $K in Season 2 for longer periods — launching in a few hours on May 15th at 6pm PT.
• OTC & Institutional Lines: the treasury can now collateralize unlocked $K to extend runway without market selling.
• New Exchanges: we continue the conversations with selected CEXs to expand and facilitate access to $K.

Each piece tightens the $K economy flywheel:

More demand for $K → higher scarcity→ higher network budget → more features→ more users → more listings → more demand.

🔗 Create an account | 🌐 Website | 📚Docs | Twitter | Discord

⛩️$K is now DeFi Collateral was originally published in Kinto on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Kinto is the modular exchange. Access the best opportunities in DeFi through our tailored blockchain and non-custodial smart wallet, engineered for maximum security and seamless user experience.

TLDR

• Perfect Storm. Macro fear, bear market collapse, DDOs & FUD attacks hit Kinto all at once but we endured and now building our way forward.
• Max supply is now 10M. Down from 15M.
• Team & Investor lock extended to April 1st 2026.
• During this week, buybacks are doubled to 2,000 tokens per day.
• Vault capacity extended to 300k. Highest APY in DeFi -> +100% USDC.
• Perfect opportunity to get involved during Sakura, the highest period in mining rewards.

Over the past two weeks, Kinto faced a true trial by fire. Kinto listed on March 31st and a perfect 🌊 storm followed.

Sell pressure overwhelming demand.
A DDoS attack against Kinto’s infrastructure.
A wave of uncertainty and fear due to bad price action.
An extreme macro selloff.
A brutal bear market shaking every corner of crypto.

In moments like this, correlations go to one — and everything liquid gets sold to protect collateral. Even the strongest projects get caught in the crossfire.

But here’s the truth:

• Storms clear the weak branches.
• The sellers have been flushed out.
• The market will eventually recover.

We’ve listened to our community. We’ve reflected. And today, we are doubling down on building the future of Kinto.

🎯 Max Supply Finalized: 10M $K

Since the launch of Engen last summer, Kinto’s community approved a total supply of 10M $K. However, the governance proposal had left open the possibility of future inflation, creating confusion around a potential maximum supply of 15M tokens.

To remove any ambiguity and add certainty during turbulent times, the Foundation is closing that door for now, setting the max supply at 10M.

Information has already been updated in CoinGecko and will be updated soon in Coinmarketcap.

Market cap is now 6M and FDV is around 40M at the $4 per K.

In a market where trust is scarce, clarity and certainty is everything.

🛡️ Team & Investor Lock Extended

Unlike many teams that rush token launches just to start vesting, Kinto took the hard road first:

• Product built & launched.
• Mainnet live for a year.
• +80,000 KYC users and +300K in revenue this year.

Still, we heard the community loud and clear.

There’s often confusion between TGE (Token Generation Event) and the transferability event that happened on March 31st.

To show full alignment with our users and investors, the team and early investors are extending their lock to April 1st, 2026 — counting from the $K listing date.

We’re here to build for the long term.

🛒 Doubling Buybacks: 2,000 $K / Day

In periods of crisis, every market needs a buyer of last resort.

Central banks step in for traditional markets.
The Foundation will step in for Kinto.

Over the next week, Kinto will double its buybacks — committing to acquire 2,000 $K per day, for a total of 14,000 $K by week’s end.

All tokens purchased will be sent directly to treasury to support ecosystem health and long-term stability.

Every day we will publish the transaction on Twitter that sends tokens to the treasury. To avoid front-running, we will reveal the wallets used for buying these tokens and the average price of tokens purchased at the end of the month.

When confidence falters, actions speak louder than words.

💰 The Vault: Highest APY in DeFi

10 days ago, when we reopened our staking Vault, it filled within hours.
Today, we’re reopening again — and extending the capacity to 300,000 $K.

The Vault offers:

• +150% APY paid in USDC — real, stable rewards.
• 50% bonus mining rewards during Sakura Season.
• Launchpad airdrops for upcoming Kinto projects.

In a sea of empty promises and diluted yields across DeFi, Kinto offers the highest real yield.

Staking $K today not only compounds your rewards — it secures your place at the heart of Kinto’s future.

🌸 The Perfect Opportunity: Sakura Season

Warren Buffet once said,

“Be greedy when others are fearful.”

Right now, fear is everywhere.
Markets are shaky. Liquidity is thin.
But history shows: These are the moments with extreme opportunity.

During Sakura season, Kinto is blooming through the storm:

• 2x mining rewards across all activity during Sakura 🌸
• 1 $K for every $500 deposit, $25K traded, or 10 $K staked — and your friend gets rewarded too
• 50% extra mining rewards when staking $K in the Kinto Vault

👉 Read more about the Sakura campaign here

Sakura Mining Season runs through June 7th — offering the highest rewards in Kinto’s history.

When others hesitate, you can step forward.

Kinto was designed to endure.

This is not the end — it’s just a new beginning.

We’re stronger, leaner, and even more committed to our mission:

Building the safest, most resilient modular exchange ecosystem.

The storm is passing. The skies are clearing.
Join us in building the next chapter.

🌸 Sakura is here.

🔗 Create an account | 🌐 Website | 📚Docs | Twitter | Discord

⛩️ $K Reloaded — Tokenomics Update was originally published in Kinto on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

TLDR

• $K will start trading today on March 31st at 8am PT
• $K Deposits and withdrawals are now enabled on the Kinto wallet.
• Listing Price is $17. 13% above ICO Price.
• $K can be traded on Kinto, Uniswap on Arbitrum and on selected CEXs including Kraken, Gate, MEXC and BingX.
• $1.5M of Protocol Owned Liquidity deployed into our Uni V3 Pool.
• We recommend users with less than 100 $K to swap directly on Kinto to avoid gas and benefit from low slippage from concentrated liquidity on Uniswap. Expected slippage should be less than 50bps.
• Users with more than 500 $K are encouraged to use limit orders on CEX exchanges to maximize trade efficiency, avoid MEV and minimize slippage on those large orders.
• As we expect heavy load during the first hours of trading, bridging fees will be temporarily increased during the first 24 hours to ensure transactions go through.

Kinto is starting a new era. $K is listing today, kickstarting the $K economy for the Modular Exchange.

📈 Listing at $17: A Fair Launch in a Tough Market

We’re listing $K at $17, just over 13% above our ICO price of $15. During the ICO, we committed to keeping the listing price slightly higher than the public sale price while still delivering a low FDV— prioritizing fairness and accessibility for the community.

Our market cap is 25.5M and FDV is $170M. Kinto has been live for a year, with more than 80K fully KYC’ed verified users and has already generated 500K in revenue in the first quarter 2025.

Since the ICO, markets suffered a big drawdown, where even blue chips like ETH have sold off more than 20% and smaller caps more than 60%. In a market where even quality assets are trading at deep discounts, we chose a conservative approach to price the token realistically while maintaining long-term upside for early believers.

We could have delayed the launch to release in a softer market but for us is really important to keep our word. It’s really difficult to say you are going to execute something by a specific date and meet it. Since we started the year we planned the launchpad, ICO and listing date and we have proved that we can consistently meet our deadlines, hell or high water.

🌐 Where You Can Trade $K

$K will be available for trading on both centralized and decentralized venues, giving users the flexibility to trade wherever they are most comfortable, and ensuring that price discovery happens fairly and transparently across the entire ecosystem.

• Kinto. Cross-Chain Swap through Musubi.
• Uniswap V3 on Arbitrum (K/WETH pool, 1% fee)
• Centralized Exchanges: Kraken, Gate, MEXC, BingX…

By launching across both CEXs and AMMs, we’re ensuring:

• Accessibility: CEXs cover a wide range of geographies and provide fiat on/off ramps, while Kinto & Uniswap offer direct self-custody access for DeFi natives.
• Liquidity Resilience: Multiple venues reduce slippage, create arbitrage opportunities, and prevent any one platform from becoming a single point of failure.
• Fair Price Discovery: With our market makers supporting liquidity across all venues, users will see consistent pricing and reduced volatility during the launch window.

Whether you’re a small retail trader or a large institutional desk, there’s a venue optimized for your needs.

💧 Protocol Liquidity: Concentrated & Efficient

To support a smooth launch and minimize volatility, the Kinto Foundation is deploying $1.5M in protocol-owned liquidity into a Uniswap V3 K/WETH pool on Arbitrum, concentrated around the current price with a 1% fee tier.

This liquidity is owned and managed by the protocol, not third parties or mercenary LPs, which means:

• It won’t be withdrawn during market volatility.
• It provides stability and slippage protection for small and mid-sized traders.
• It ensures that the decentralized venue remains a reliable way to buy or sell $K.

We’re also actively working with Arrakis Finance to structure and optimize this liquidity position using advanced automated vault strategies. Arrakis’ infrastructure will enable us to keep the pool balanced, capture more fees, and extend the depth of the market as demand increases.

Later this week, we plan to launch a second pool paired with USDC on Uniswap V4, allowing stablecoin-based trading and even more efficient price discovery for users coming from other ecosystems.

This combination of protocol-owned capital and smart liquidity management ensures that DeFi-native users will enjoy consistent, on-chain liquidity from day one.

Uniswap Pool Address: https://arbiscan.io/address/0x4e6C10E2B505a1E8324Aa64d3A92de764cf86783#code

👛 Retail Traders: Use Kinto for Efficiency

If you want to buy or sell less than 100 $K, we strongly recommend trading via Kinto’s built-in wallet interface that makes chain-less swaps a breeze.

Why?

• No gas fees (on our native rollup).
• Bridging is automatic and abstracted.
• Sub-50 bps expected slippage due to tight AMM bands
• Optimal UX for small transactions

This design protects AMM LPs from whale-driven slippage and ensures a smooth experience for the >95% of users who are retail.

👉 You can swap K on our swap page.

👉 You can deposit & withdraw K on the asset page.

🐋 Whales: Use CEXs & Limit Orders

If you’re moving more than 500 $K, CEXs (like Kraken and Gate) are your best path to buy and sell.

Why?

• Market makers will support mid-price execution
• Limit orders offer more efficient trades without impacting price
• No MEV exposure and better routing for large volumes

Our MM partners will provide consistent spreads and liquidity to ensure price stability at launch.

👉 Trade $K on Gate | Trade $K on Kraken | Trade $K on MEXC

⛓️ Bridging Fees Temporarily Raised

To guarantee smooth transaction finality during peak launch demand, bridging fees will be temporarily increased for 24 hours.

This is done to:

• Reduce spam and failed txs
• Ensure L1-to-L2 and L2-to-L1 flows settle reliably
• Allow prioritized processing for real users and market makers

Normal fees will resume after the launch window stabilizes.

🌸 Don’t Miss Sakura: The Most Rewarding Time

This is just the beginning. With governance, staking, wallet recovery, lending, and the Launchpad all coming online — $K is more than just a token. With $K now officially trading, there’s never been a better time to become a Kinto user.

Our Sakura Mining Season is live and runs until June 7th, offering the highest rewards ever in Kinto’s history. Whether you’re a new user or long-time supporter, you can earn real value by participating in the network today.

Key highlights:

• 2x mining rewards across all activity during Sakura 🌸
• 1 $K for every $500 deposit, $25K traded, or 10 $K staked — and your friend gets rewarded too
• 50% extra mining rewards when staking $K in the Kinto Vault
• Stakers receive 20% APY in USDC, in addition to full airdrop and launchpad eligibility

👉 Read more about the Sakura campaign here

If you’re just getting started, staking $K is the best way to:

• Earn 20% APY in USDC
• Receive a 50% bonus in mining rewards
• Qualify for future airdrops from launchpad projects
• Get priority access to all upcoming Kinto Launchpad offerings

Now that $K is live, your tokens are more than just tradable assets — they’re the key to a growing, high-utility ecosystem. It’s the coordination layer for a new exchange, that is fully modular and owned by its users.

Join the K economy.

🔗 Create an account | 🌐 Website | 📚Docs | Twitter | Discord

⛩️ $K Listing Day Guide was originally published in Kinto on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Kinto is the Modular Exchange. Access the best assets in DeFi through our tailored blockchain and custom smart contract wallet, engineered for maximum security and seamless user experience

TLDR

• To celebrate the $K listing, we are kickstarting our biggest mining season — Sakura.
• We are doubling the base mining rewards during this period.
• Referral program has been extended, for every new user your refer that meets the requirements, you both get 1 $K.
• $K staked will receive a 50% extra mining bonus.
• Sakura Season will last until June 7th.

During last summer, Kinto was launched as the first blockchain to enforce sybil resistance and mandatory smart contract wallets by default. Over 25,000 users joined our launch campaign, laying the foundation for a secure, compliant, and user-first network.

We soon introduced the Kinto Mining Program— our long-term vision to grow the ecosystem by distributing up to 33% of the token supply to users, builders, and capital allocators over a ten-year period.

In the fall, we kicked off our first seasonal campaign, Momiji🍁, which drove a wave of new adoption. By the end of the campaign, Kinto had surpassed 70,000 fully KYC’d users and $80M in TVL.

This momentum carried into winter with Onsen ❄️, a rewards program focused on liquidity, lending, and onboarding capital. Onsen helped us bootstrap our perpetuals feature, reaching more than $700M in volume traded.

Now, with the $K token scheduled to be listed on March 31st, we’re launching our third mining season: Sakura 🌸.

This spring campaign brings the highest rewards ever offered on Kinto and focuses on expanding deposits, staking, referrals, and network activity as we prepare for $K to enter price discovery.

Let the season of renewal — and rewards — begin.

🌸 Sakura is blooming (桜)

Sakura (桜) is the Japanese word for cherry blossoms — delicate, fleeting, and profoundly symbolic. Every spring, communities across Japan gather beneath the blooming trees to celebrate hanami (花見) — the tradition of viewing cherry blossoms.

But Sakura is more than just a flower or a picnic. It represents a time of renewal, fleeting beauty, and fresh beginnings. It’s a season where nature reminds us to be present, to appreciate what we have, and to act before the moment passes.

Kinto is going to be listed on March 31st and this will mark the beginning of a new season. Just like the blossoms, the Sakura Campaign is here for a limited time — a chance to bloom, earn, and celebrate the $K economy. 🌸

⛩️ Sakura comes to Kinto

As the cherry blossoms bloom, so do your opportunities.
This spring, Kinto is launching the Sakura Campaign — the highest-reward season we’ve ever done.

Starting today, all participants will receive 1.5x base rewards across mining, referrals, and usage.

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 Bring Your Friends, Get Rewarded

We’ve supercharged our referral program:

For every new Kinto user you refer, you both earn 1K when they complete any of the following:

• 💰 Deposit $500 for at least 1 month
• 📈 Trade $5,000 in perpetuals
• 🔒 Stake at least 10 $K tokens

No limits. No cap. The more friends you onboard, the more you earn.

🌊 Hyperliquid fees are now discounted 50%

As promised, we are now heavily reducing our perpetual trading fees.

• New Base Kinto Fee: 5bps
• Added major discounts as your trading volume increases.

🔁 Use Kinto, Earn K

During Sakura, you’ll earn 1K every time you:

• 🌀 Trade $5,000 in perpetuals
• 🔄 Swap $5,000 worth of assets
• 💵 Lend $5,000 worth of collateral

These rewards stack with both referral bonuses and the 2x mining rewards.

💎 Boosted Mining Rewards for $K Stakers

Staking $K in the Kinto Vault now earns you 50% more mining rewards throughout the Sakura season.

This is the best time to lock your $K and earn real yield while supporting the network.

⏳ Don’t Miss It

Sakura will run for a limited time only. It will end on June 7th.

This is your chance to earn more $K, unlock new rewards, and help grow the modular exchange movement.

Get started now 🌸

https://kinto.xyz

We want to accelerate the transition to an on-chain financial system. A system that can match the guarantees of traditional finance, increase availability 24/7, enhance security, and decrease the friction and costs associated with conventional asset issuance.

If you share our vision for a secure, open, decentralized financial system, help us realize it.

🌐 Website | 📚Docs | Twitter | Discord

🌸 Spring Mining Season — Sakura 🌸 was originally published in Kinto on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

TLDR

• $K will be listed on March 31st.
• VC Investors will be locked until July 1st so only retail can sell.
• 15% of the supply will be circulating on listing day.
• $K can be staked until May 15th and receive 20% APY in USDC.
• $K can be also used to buy wallet insurance, trigger a full account recovery, vote on governance and mine rewards.
• $K will be lendable as collateral during the month of April.

Soon, $K will be available for trading on Kinto, and both centralized and decentralized exchanges. From March 31st, traders, investors and speculators will be able to buy and sell $K to find the token fair dollar value.

Once the $K token has a monetary value, it unlocks infinite possibilities for the network and Kinto users.

In this post, we are going to cover all the token mechanics that will be available in the immediate future.

🥘 Retail comes first

From the beginning, it has been our north star to make sure that the team doesn’t see any upside if there is no value created. In traditional venture, teams only see an exit after many years of work and have the usual 4-year vesting. We have added that same vesting schedule for the team and also pushed the initial unlock beyond October 2025.

Our initial intention was to unlock both our private investors and users on the same day to have accelerated price discovery and converge to a real price without overhanging unlocks.

However, given the recent market action, and uncertain macro environment, we have decided along with our investors to make sure retail and only retail can trade on listing day.

Retail gets first dibs.

That means that on listing day, only Kinto users (10%) and pre-sale participants (2.5%) can freely trade. Retail can freely trade with the assurance that insiders and investors are locked.

Rest of the trading supply comes from market makers and liquidity provided for DEXs and CEXs.

📣 Introducing Staking: Earn 20% APY in USDC

$K holders will have the opportunity to stake their tokens until May 15th and receive 20% APY paid in USDC. This mechanism is designed to reward long-term believers in Kinto and create additional stability during the initial trading phase.

How Staking Works

• Users can stake their $K in a dedicated vault.
• Rewards are distributed in USDC, providing a predictable return.
• The staking period ends on May 15th, at which point stakers can withdraw both their principal and earned rewards.
• The staking pool is capped to ensure sustainability, so early participants benefit the most.
• Staked $K will also receive 50% extra mining rewards in the new season that starts on March 21st.

By staking $K, holders not only earn a solid APY but also contribute to the early stability of the token.

Staking will be available on March 21st 1pm PST in the K asset page
https://engen.kinto.xyz/explore/k

🔐 Wallet Insurance & Full Account Recovery

One of the key innovations of the Kinto ecosystem is self-custody with institutional-grade security. Holders of $K can already purchase wallet insurance and trigger a full account recovery in case of a lost seed phrase or compromised private key.

How It Works:

• Users can lock $K to receive additional wallet insurance protection.
• If an account is compromised, they can initiate a full recovery process using a decentralized verification mechanism.
• This ensures Kinto wallets are as safe as traditional bank accounts, but without the risks of centralized custody.

Kinto is redefining self-custody by making it both secure and recoverable, a major breakthrough for mainstream adoption.

🗳️ Governance: Your Vote Shapes Kinto

$K isn’t just a trading asset — it’s the backbone of Kinto’s governance model. Starting September 1st, $K holders will be able to vote on Nio elections, which will determine key protocol decisions and upgrades.

Governance Highlights:

• Proposals: $K holders can submit and vote on proposals to shape the network’s future.
• Nio Elections: Community representatives will be elected to guide governance decisions.
• Decentralized Decision-Making: Ensuring that Kinto remains community-driven.

This is a critical step toward making Kinto a truly decentralized modular exchange, where users have a real say in its evolution.

💎 $K as Collateral: Borrow Against Your Holdings

During April, $K will be available as collateral for lending. This means users will be able to borrow against their Kinto holdings without having to sell their tokens.

Key Benefits:

• Unlock liquidity without selling your $K.
• Use $K for leverage or yield strategies while still maintaining exposure to the ecosystem.
• Enables DeFi integrations with lending protocols and credit markets.

As the ecosystem matures, we expect $K to play a key role in on-chain finance, allowing users to maximize capital efficiency while holding a stake in Kinto’s future.

The Future of $K

With only 15% of supply circulating on listing day, the early trading environment will be driven purely by retail demand.

Between staking, governance, wallet recovery, and lending, $K is far more than just another exchange token — it’s an integral part of the Kinto ecosystem and the foundation for the future of modular exchanges.

March 31st: The journey begins. Are you ready?

Leave CEXs behind, join the Modular Exchange Revolution.

Join us!

🌐 Website | 📚Docs | Twitter | Discord

⛩️ Introducing the $K Economy was originally published in Kinto on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.