Loopring
Raised 120,000 ETH in 2017, then had to hand most of it back
An Ethereum trading protocol that became one of the first zero-knowledge rollups on mainnet, running its own exchange, AMM, smart wallet and DeFi products on top.
- Token sale (announced)
Recorded announced backing; this is separate from cash received, customer deposits and money recovered.
Funding
| Round | Date | Announced | Investors |
|---|---|---|---|
| LRC token sale | Unknown | Not disclosed |
Announced is what was said at the time. Cash actually received is rarely disclosed and is not assumed to match.
People
| Name | Role | Period | Now | Last checked |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Daniel Wang | — | Not established | Oct 2026 |
Timeline
16 August 2017
Subscriptions in ether ran from 1 to 16 August 2017.
September 2017
After Chinese regulators ordered ICO proceeds returned, the founder said the team gave back 85% or more of the ether, and kept building with what was left.
28 May 2025
The team said the mobile smart wallet would go offline on 30 June 2025 and that the Layer 2 protocol was unaffected. The wallet had suffered a breach through its two-factor authentication in June 2024.
30 June 2025
31 July 2025
The team said it would focus on its Layer 2.
28 June 2026
Trading stopped immediately. The team said it would publish final balances, allow two weeks to report discrepancies, then send funds to users' Ethereum addresses.
How it ended
Loopring closed in stages. Its smart wallet app stopped on 30 June 2025 and its DeFi products were sunset by 31 July 2025. On 28 June 2026 it shut its exchange, AMM and trade relayer with immediate effect, saying it had never gained broad adoption and citing its lack of a virtual machine, weak business development and the delisting of its LRC token by major exchanges. Instead of the rollup's self-custody exit, the team said it would upgrade the contract so that only its own addresses could move assets out, and send balances of $10 or more to users' Ethereum addresses at its own gas cost.
Still alive
Open spot
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Sources
9 sources behind this page.
- 1Loopring to Shut Down DEX Service, Relayer · Bloomingbit · Jun 2026
- 2Ethereum zkRollup focused Loopring Winds Down Its Decentralized Exchange (DEX) Operations · Crowdfund Insider · Jun 2026
- 3Loopring to cease wallet operations on June 30 · crypto.news · May 2025
- 4Interview with Daniel Wang, CEO and Founder of Loopring Foundation · DeFi Prime
- 5Loopring to Sunset DeFi Products by July 31 · FastBull (via Coindar)
- 6Blockchain start-up Loopring raises US$45m in ICO as regulator intensifies scrutiny of cryptocurrency market · South China Morning Post · Aug 2017
- 7Loopring Shuts Down Its DEX Disabling the Trustless Exit It Pioneered · The Crypto Times · Jun 2026
- 8Decentralized Money Shouldn't be Traded on Centralized Exchanges: Loopring Founder Daniel Wang · The Defiant
- 9X search: @loopringorg posts mentioning "founder" · twitterapi.io (X data provider)
Every figure above is clickable and opens the sources behind it. Copies were stored when each source was read, so a citation still resolves after the page it came from is gone.