TIA Token big dump: A microcosm of the collapse of the encryption industry narrative

The TIA Token, which was the focus of attention during the early 2024 bull market, has now fallen below its listing price. As of now, the TIA price is only $1.62, down more than 90% from its historical high of around $20. Once a leading project in the modular blockchain field, TIA is now caught in a whirlpool of negative public opinion regarding founder sell-offs and internal management issues.

The decline of this once-star project not only symbolizes the fall of the modular blockchain track but also reflects how the previously heated narratives in the cryptocurrency industry are being debunked one by one. On one hand, there is the stock market feast with the Nasdaq index hitting new highs, while on the other hand, there is the collapse of various narratives in the cryptocurrency field and the big dump of coin prices. The traditional cryptocurrency narratives are becoming increasingly difficult to sustain, and the industry is entering a period of real testing for practical applications.

From Glory to Fall

TIA, short for Celestia, is one of the highly anticipated modular blockchain projects from the end of 2023 to the beginning of 2024. At the beginning of 2024, the price of TIA Token soared from single digits after the airdrop to a high of 20 dollars. The project's vision is to combine the sovereign interoperability zone of Cosmos with the shared security aggregation model of Ethereum.

However, starting in the second half of 2024, as market enthusiasm declined and ecological advancement slowed, governance and team issues of Celestia gradually came to light. The most controversial point is the suspicion of collective cashing out by senior management. Some users disclosed that in early October 2024, all executives of Celestia completed the token unlock and began large-scale sales. One co-founder was accused of selling over 25 million dollars worth of tokens in the over-the-counter market and then quietly moving overseas.

At the same time, Celestia's marketing efforts have also encountered backlash. The actions of several well-known figures endorsing TIA have been questioned for potential conflicts of interest. Deeper rifts within the management stem from the dismissal of a former developer relations manager due to inappropriate behavior, leading to a public relations crisis. Celestia has also been reported to have acquired competitors at high prices and forced them to withdraw from collaborations with other projects, which has sparked considerable controversy.

At a time when the coin price was experiencing a big dump and community trust was collapsing, a co-founder proposed a radical governance model of "governance is proof" in early 2025, advocating for off-chain governance voting to replace the traditional proof-of-stake mechanism to address ongoing inflationary pressure. However, before this proposal could be implemented, the fact that team executives were cashing out was gradually exposed, leading the community to generally believe that this was merely a guise for "stabilizing prices and covering up issues."

Currently, the TIA price has fallen over 90% from its peak. On-chain activity is also bleak, with on-chain transaction fee revenue of only $231 in the last 24 hours.

The Fall of TIA: The Collapse of Narrative in the Encryption Industry

The decline of TIA is not just the failure of a single project, but a microcosm of the disillusionment of the entire encryption industry’s new narrative.

In the past cycle, concepts such as modularization, AI Agent, DePIN, GameFi, and NFT have all stirred up a frenzy, welcoming the excitement of capital and retail investors. However, by 2025, we witnessed the collective collapse of these narratives, with numerous small coins in a state of despair.

Similar to TIA, leading projects in various sectors such as WorldCoin and Helium, which were once favored by capital, gained a lot of attention and experienced a big dump in coin prices in a short period due to narrative tailwinds. However, this hype often proves to be fleeting and quickly cools down.

The fall of these star Tokens reflects a deeper crisis in the encryption industry: the lack of real technological innovation and user adoption, which leads to a continuous depletion of narrative and trust. After modularization, it is also difficult to find new narratives at the public chain level. Meanwhile, there are still some voices in other tracks, such as the combination of AI and blockchain, which mostly remain at the conceptual level, while RWA faces dual challenges of regulation and real demand.

The former hotspots have been debunked and quickly forgotten. Meanwhile, positive news continues to emerge from the traditional financial markets. Whether in the US stock market or the Hong Kong stock market, stocks related to encryption compliance, such as stablecoins and compliant exchange concept stocks, have been continuously rising.

On one hand, there is a lack of innovation in native encryption and a big dump in coin prices, while on the other hand, compliant encryption projects are favored by the capital market. Some believe this indicates a decline in the industry, but in reality, it is a warning to all projects: only true technological innovation and application landing can create lasting value. The old routine of the traditional encryption circle, relying on storytelling, traffic battles, and pump-and-dump tactics, is becoming increasingly unsustainable. Today's Web3 projects, like Web2 projects, are truly competing on the ability to implement applications.