Ethereum (ETH) co-founder Vitalik Buterin has drawn much applause by donating a substantial amount of assets in legal aid of the Tornado Cash developers. Notably, this act comes after the prominent crypto figure stirred the market’s attention with a massive sell-off from his memecoin holdings.

Vitalik Buterin Supports Tornado Cash Founders With $242,000 ETH

In an X post on Saturday, Wu blockchain reported that Vitalik Buterin swapped different amounts of memecoins in his wallet for about 140.6 ETH valued at $340,000. The tokens sold included 70.71 million Neiro, 11.76 billion MOONDENG, 7.8 million DEGEN, 16.03 billion KABOSU, as well as 100,000 USDT donated by the CATE project. 

Following these transactions, blockchain analytics platform Spot on Chain noted that the Ethereum co-founder contributed 100 ETH, worth $242,000 to the legal defense fund of Tornado Cash developers Alexey Pertsev and Roman Storm. This follows a previous donation of 30 ETH valued then at $112,000 by Buterin in May to the same cause. 

Pertsev and Storm are two of the three founders of the crypto mixer platform Tornado Cash which has come under criticism by national authorities as a tool for enabling criminal activities. According to the US Department of Justice, Tornado Cash has facilitated over $1 billion in money laundering since its launch in 2019.

Currently, both developers are stuck in legal battles with Pertsev serving a five-year sentence in the Netherlands while Roman Storm is awaiting trial in the US following his arrest in August 2023. Meanwhile, the location of the third co-founder Roman Semenov remains unknown. It is currently uncertain if Buterin had diverted the profits from his memecoin sale to the “Free Alexey & Roman” defense campaign. However, the Ethereum co-founder has a history of offloading memecoins to donate to a charitable cause. 

Notably in August, Buteri

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Author: Semilore Faleti