The official X account for heavy metal band Metallica appears to have been hacked, with the exploiters using the breach to promote a Solana token with the ticker METAL.
The token was first announced on the official Metallica X account in a June 26 post, which claimed the token — launched on the Solana-based token deployer pump.fun — was in partnership with Ticketmaster.
Ticketmaster has not made any public announcement about the partnership and did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Posts from Metallica’s account claimed fintech firm MoonPay was involved with the token, which MoonPay president Keith Grossman dismissed in an X post, saying, “MoonPay does NOT support METAL.”
A pinned post on Metallica’s account promoting the token points to the band’s official website, which has no information about the token.
A series of subsequent posts in an apparent attempt to drum up buyers claimed users could cash in their METAL tokens to redeem exclusive items, including “free concert tickets,” custom gaming consoles and merchandise. One post even claimed the token would have staking rewards.
The total value of the METAL token reached a brief peak of just over $3 million roughly 20 minutes after it was launched, per Dexscreener data.
Related: Crypto hacks soar to $19B in 13 years: Crystal Intelligence
The value of the METAL token has since plummeted more than 77%, falling to a total market capitalization of $663,000 at the time of publication.
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