Onchain Robinhood 🌈

GM, Aleks here.

The crypto industry has seen a wave of mergers and acquisitions this year. On Monday, we got what appears to be 2025’s first attempt at a DeFi hostile takeover. 

It’s a story in two parts. Here’s the first: Rainbow, which bills itself as the “largest independent Ethereum-only wallet,” said it intends to launch a token, RNBW.

Less than three hours later, Rainbow published an open letter to investors in Clanker, a Pump.fun-style token launchpad on the Base blockchain. 

“We believe Clanker is one of the most important projects in all of Ethereum and want to see the Clanker community continue bringing so much onchain joy,” Rainbow’s founders wrote. “Our proposal is for the Rainbow Foundation to acquire Clanker.” 

Rainbow said it would give 4% of the RNBW supply to investors who own the Clanker token, as well as all the Clanker tokens that have accrued as LP fees to date. Future fees would go toward Clanker traders and creators, as well as investors who stake RNBW. 

The deal will give Clanker direction and make it a “foundational pillar within Rainbow as we build onchain Robinhood,” the letter concludes. 

It appears investors liked the proposal: The Clanker token immediately shot up more than 40%, to about $40.

Here’s the second part of this story: On Monday evening, Clanker founder Jack Dishman threw cold water on the proposed takeover. 

According to Dishman, Rainbow had first approached Clanker a month earlier. 

“After some discussions, we decided that it wasn’t the right fit and let them know last Thursday,” Dishman wrote on X. 

The next day, Rainbow threatened to make its offer public, and when Clanker didn’t want to go forward, Rainbow “published the letter today without our consent,” he wrote. 

“We are not excited about working at Rainbow, especially after how we were treated, and don’t plan to continue the conversations,” Dishman said.

Because this is crypto, the tiff continued to play out on social media. Rainbow said it had been approached by Clanker; that both sides had agreed on the very terms in the letter published Monday; that Clanker then “cold shouldered” the crypto wallet. 

“Sharing the letter was hardly a threat. The Clanker community is as much a part of this as you are. Today’s price action shows that they think this is a good deal,” Rainbow said from its X account. 

“If you believe there is a better path for Clanker holders, we invite you to put forward an alternative proposal. What’s the plan?” 

Top DeFi stories of the week 🤖 

This week in DeFi governance ⚖️ 

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Post of the week 💥

In July, SEC Chair Paul Atkins said he was considering an “innovation exemption” that would let entrepreneurs immediately launch businesses without having to comply with “incompatible or burdensome” regulations. According to a new Bloomberg report, that exemption could come before year’s end.

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