The Ethereum layer-2 network Blast is shutting its doors after the operational expenses of the chain surpassed the incoming revenue.
Via a Friday post on X, Blast stated that it lacks any “credible path” toward financial viability and urged participants to withdraw their funds back to the Ethereum mainnet.
“We introduced Blast with the mission of establishing a self-sustaining blockchain for builders and users,” the creators stated. “Sadly, the economics behind running the chain are no longer viable.”
Source: Blast
The platform will shorten its withdrawal waiting period to 24 hours, although withdrawals will temporarily halt while Blast liquidates its Lido holdings, an operation expected to require roughly a week.
Participants have until October 26 to pull funds through the Blast dashboard. Following that date, funds will remain reachable, but retrieving them will necessitate interacting directly with the bridge contracts on Ethereum.
Blast noted it will release guidelines regarding bridge-contract withdrawals prior to the October 26 deadline and advised users to transfer their holdings to the Ethereum mainnet beforehand.
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Blast Spun Out of Blur’s NFT Expansion
Blast was established by Tieshun “Pacman” Roquerre, creator of the NFT marketplace Blur, which debuted in October 2022 and swiftly rivaled OpenSea by appealing to professional traders via token incentives. By the close of 2022, Blur had exceeded the trading volume of the then-dominant NFT exchange OpenSea, expanding its lead into early 2023, bolstered by trader rewards and a token airdrop.
Roquerre announced Blast in November 2023, offering native yields on stablecoins and Ether (ETH) alongside a points system tied to an anticipated token distribution. This approach helped secure over $2 billion in deposits prior to the rollout of its mainnet in February 2024.
Blast’s DeFi TVL has dropped past 98% since its peak in June 2024. Source: DefiLlama
Nevertheless, maintaining Blast’s expansion proved challenging amid a wider contraction in the NFT sector. Its decentralized finance total value locked has declined continuously following its peak of approximately $2.2 billion in June 2024, dropping in excess of 98% since then, per figures from DeFiLlama.
Blur has experienced a comparable contraction. Its total value locked, which climbed past $200 million during its peak in early 2024, now sits at roughly $27 million.
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