Previously on July 5th, Data Ownership Protocol had its token generation event and was listed on multiple exchanges. $DOP, the project’s native token, went live for trading which was well awaited by those who participated in the private sales and airdrops. However, the $DOP community reacted negatively and expressed their disappointment with the project’s token launch. 

Why was that the case? There are some key reasons as to why the $DOP launch under-delivered to its community.

DOP tokenomics

In DOP’s whitepaper, its tokenomics mentioned how tokens are to be distributed between investors, airdrop participants, and its team. DOP had its pre-sale allocated with 2% of its total supply and its price was at $0.01 per $DOP while the private sale, which took a whopping 28% of its supply, was priced between $0.01 and $0.08 per $DOP.

Investors quickly took the opportunity to scoop up these tokens before it had its token generation event in expectation of a successful launch, allowing them to have some significant gain.

Expectations all over social media on the initial price for $DOP was anticipated to be above $0.09 as people assumed that the launch price would be higher than the private sale and its market cap would reach close to $1 billion. However, the initial listing was met with disappointment as it failed to reach above the private sale price.

$DOP initially launched at $0.025, briefly tapping $0.032 in its first hours of trading. Due to poor market conditions, $DOP plummeted to a low of $0.0074 before recovering to $0.014 as of June 8th. The initial launch price would have incurred a loss of 40% while the current price would have been an 80% loss for private sale participants.

On top of that, a large portion of the tokens will be released within the next 2-3 years. These unlocks, especially the team’s allocations, pose a threat of dump if these investors decide to sell.

Will $DOP recover?

The team is aware of its community’s negative feedback about the token launch. In a blog post, they explained that the exchanges are the sole entities of its launch price, which the market corrects the price after a few seconds of trading. 

They have also expressed their next steps to solve the token price issue through different ways:

Increase Liquidity: DOP will be allocating more than $5 million USDT to purchase $DOP and supply liquidity to a number of exchanges. They will then be transferring these tokens to the DAO.

Transparent Communication: The team is dedicated to bring more regular updates and insights into plans and actions. The project aims to build trust through transparency by informing the community at every stage.

Community Support: DOP’s Telegram and Discord communities have moderators on duty around-the-clock. In the upcoming months, a weekly AMA will be held to hear from the community and offer assistance and solutions.

Future Token Burn: On July 8th a token burn will take place in accordance with the original project plan and include about 100 million $DOP tokens. Tokens will be sent to pre-locked wallets with different lock-up settings in order to carry out the burning procedure. The team believes this shows a dedication to the project's sustainability and is in line with the tokenomics goal.

While DOP certainly has its aims on rebuilding trust and confidence within the community, it is apparent that the token launch started out as a disappointment due to the underwhelming launch price. DOP has promised a Binance listing which will open up a flow of liquidity from millions of users which may contribute to its price. However, it is still a promise that is still in progress.

As investors, there are always certain risks to incur when investing in projects no matter the scale. It is important to do further research on the project's background to stay informed and possibly mitigate losses.

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