As of now, we can confirm that quite a number of L2 / Rollup projects have ceased operations, but the reasons vary greatly, including:
· Proactive shutdown / strategic pivot
· The economic model cannot be sustained
· Shutting down after being attacked
· Bankruptcy
· Team disappears / suspected rug-pull / running off
And our Blast, from 2B➡️32M, is mainly shut down for the same reason:
L2 operating costs > the revenue generated by L2
This actually points to a very real issue:
TVL ≠ revenue ≠ business model
If we reclassify by “cause of death,” it becomes even more interesting:
① The economic model couldn’t hold up
Blast, Botanix, Redstone
Shared characteristics: technical capability, funding, and users/TVL—but the real fee revenue cannot cover the ongoing operating costs.
Blast is especially典型：once it had $2B+ TVL → around $32M, and ultimately the official team directly admitted that the revenue could not cover the costs.
② Hacker / security incidents
Kinto isn’t really about “not having users,” but rather:
Exploit → asset losses → token collapse → debt / funding pressure → shutdown.
③ Strategic pivot
Aztec Connect, Fluence, Sophon, ZERO
These shouldn’t be called “running off.” A more accurate description is: giving up maintaining their own L2 and shifting resources to businesses with higher commercial value.
For example, Fluence directly shut down its L2 and migrated assets back to Ethereum; Sophon shifted its chain-migration strategy toward Base applications.
④ Bankruptcy
The most worth listing separately right now is: Movement Labs
This is strictly a company-level Chapter 11 bankruptcy, but it’s also not the traditional “exit scam/rug-pull with cash.”
⑤ Suspected rug-pull / ran off
Gemholic / GemSwap: the project previously locked about 921 ETH due to smart contract issues; after funds were restored, the team transferred approximately $3.3M in assets and deleted/disappeared their social accounts, and was then hit with rug-pull allegations.
In this market, it’s really not easy to survive—every month and every week, projects across various tracks stop operating. As the saying goes: watch your pocket, and safety should always come first!
· Proactive shutdown / strategic pivot
· The economic model cannot be sustained
· Shutting down after being attacked
· Bankruptcy
· Team disappears / suspected rug-pull / running off
And our Blast, from 2B➡️32M, is mainly shut down for the same reason:
L2 operating costs > the revenue generated by L2
This actually points to a very real issue:
TVL ≠ revenue ≠ business model
If we reclassify by “cause of death,” it becomes even more interesting:
① The economic model couldn’t hold up
Blast, Botanix, Redstone
Shared characteristics: technical capability, funding, and users/TVL—but the real fee revenue cannot cover the ongoing operating costs.
Blast is especially典型：once it had $2B+ TVL → around $32M, and ultimately the official team directly admitted that the revenue could not cover the costs.
② Hacker / security incidents
Kinto isn’t really about “not having users,” but rather:
Exploit → asset losses → token collapse → debt / funding pressure → shutdown.
③ Strategic pivot
Aztec Connect, Fluence, Sophon, ZERO
These shouldn’t be called “running off.” A more accurate description is: giving up maintaining their own L2 and shifting resources to businesses with higher commercial value.
For example, Fluence directly shut down its L2 and migrated assets back to Ethereum; Sophon shifted its chain-migration strategy toward Base applications.
④ Bankruptcy
The most worth listing separately right now is: Movement Labs
This is strictly a company-level Chapter 11 bankruptcy, but it’s also not the traditional “exit scam/rug-pull with cash.”
⑤ Suspected rug-pull / ran off
Gemholic / GemSwap: the project previously locked about 921 ETH due to smart contract issues; after funds were restored, the team transferred approximately $3.3M in assets and deleted/disappeared their social accounts, and was then hit with rug-pull allegations.
In this market, it’s really not easy to survive—every month and every week, projects across various tracks stop operating. As the saying goes: watch your pocket, and safety should always come first!
