The explosive rise of $LAB to a ~6 billion dollar fully diluted valuation has led to serious investigation from the crypto community.
New research, reliant on both chain intelligence and whistleblower accounts, reveals a meticulous arrangement of loans between insiders, OTC placements with selected funds, and the activities of market makers, all conducted in complete secrecy while the general public only sees superficial price movement.
Researchers and analysts have published in-depth analyses of the structure and functioning of LAB, including ZachXBT, along with additional data from sjdedic.
1/ An investigation into the opaque private loans/OTC, unilateral vesting changes, market maker coordination, unknown float, and >95% supply control behind $LAB's recent pump to $6B FDV.
Here's why @LABtrade_ represents everything wrong with the current meta of retail extraction… pic.twitter.com/L2U5kW1EUd
— ZachXBT (@zachxbt) May 14, 2026
Contents
Roots & Early Warning Signs
$LAB launched in October 2025 as the leading token of an exchange ecosystem by founders Vova Sadkov and Mark. Immediately, however, the history of this team raised alarm bells.
Eesee ( $ESE), their previous project, let their investors down after the team stopped developing for longer-term and left stakeholders out in the cold. While this legacy casts a long shadow on the unfolding story of LAB.
The project has also significantly refused to provide clear token distribution whilst it received a series of endorsements from key players in the industry, major names including Lemniscap, OKX, Animoca, GSR, Gate, KuCoin, Mirana and Amber.
Meanwhile data aggregators like CoinGecko, RootData and CoinMarketCap all report wildly different circulating supply figures, while the only official documentation we can see on LAB is thin-throughout. Such diffulgence breeds uncertainty, and provides fertile soil for insiders to capitalize on.
A Supply in Control of Insiders
Studying the networks on-chain shows a very strong centralisation: it seems insiders own more than 95% of the total LAB supply.
Such consolidation gives a few firms outsized influence over price direction, liquidity management and market sentiment, clearly undermining claims that it is a fair and open market in any meaningful sense.
To compound matters, the team has started making unilateral changes without wide disclosure. Of particular concern were the previously discussed vesting terms for the Legion public sale, which appeared to have been stealthily increased from a 3-month cliff to a 9-month cliff, though investors learned of this change through direct communication as opposed to official announcements.
At the same time, many creators are also reporting extended delays of months in receiving promised marketing payouts, adding to concerns about the company’s clarity and accountability.
Private Financing and Shadow Banking
Behind the scenes, LAB appears to be fueled by a network of private loan agreements and off-market deals.
One such contract outlines a loan offering 7.5% monthly interest over six months. The borrower, The Lab Management Ltd., a British Virgin Islands shell entity, lists Vladimir Sadkov as director..
Most importantly, the agreement allows repayment in LAB tokens at the market rate of the cryptocurrency if it is unable to pay back. That clause essentially controls on when we actually release tokens into the market.
The borrower also uses the address of this contract to conduct publicly connected LAB buybacks, linking internal financing activities with market operations.
Deeper investigation reveals correlations between this wallet and additional borrowing wallets, also with crypto moving to exchange accounts supposedly associated with Sadkov himself. Interestingly, these accounts also received prior deposits linked to Eesee, meaning this financial behavior aggregates after projects.
Mixing corporate and personal funds poses a real governance and conflict-of-interest risk.
OTC Deals and Found Unlocks
Since early 2026, a small number of OTC and loan deals have been quietly offered to certain parties.
In Telegram groups, you can see Co-founder Mark floating an appeal for OTC buyers while other offers circulated further down the pecking order on better known messaging platform WhatsApp as follows:
- Loans subject to a 5% monthly interest
- 60% off OTC allocations with vesting cliffs
- Re-proportioned assured discount constructs calculated month-to-month
- Fixed 20 discounts on the other parts of the tranchable classes
The most flashy of the offers was aimed at KOL Capital participants who were able to acquire tokens at an 80% discount with gradual unlocks in August and September. In these deals, customers had to publicly promote LAB before being able to receive their allocation.
These vehicles create latent supply gluts, undiscoverable by the public. As the price of assets with variable pricing grow, the discounts that are built into these agreements appear to be widening – which only increases any remaining market imbalance.
Match Maker Coordination and Exchange Activity
There is evidence supporting that the market actions of LAB are far from organic.
We see this huge movement of the tokens with a significant large volume mostly on central exchanges like Bitget. Over 226 million LAB tokens, or ~2% of circulating supply, were staked into Bitget addresses between March and April of 2026.
These tokens were inactive for weeks until a first massive withdrawal of 100 million LAB tokens that made the rounds in crypto social media.
Investigators believe an unknown market maker at Chinese exchanges is controlling liquidity and price action via methods similar to those used in previous tokens like RIVER, RAVE, SIREN, MYX and SKYAI.
The situation worsens as wallets connected to manipulation scams in the past are revealed. Only one signer on the LAB multisig wallets received funds from an address linked to activity relating to RIVER, which had offshore withdrawals of over $12 million worth of tokens via centralized exchange in recent months.
Retail Left In The Dark
The most alarming part of the LAB case might be the complete information asymmetry. The team is well aware of the token unlocks while market makers facilitate liquidity positioning. Across OTC buyers, there is an awareness of how discounted their entry points are and the vesting timelines.
At the same time, retail investors only observe the token price in the market without visibility into underlying pressures on it.
This imbalance creates a fundamentally maladaptive situation in which price changes can be deliberately created while seeming organic.
Regardless of these concerns many well known exchanges are still allowing LAB trading. According to critics, exchanges like Bitget, Binance and Gate have the visibility – and responsibility – to step in either by freezing profits linked to insiders or even delisting the token completely.
Outrage Within The Community And Appeals For Answerability
It is possible that the wider crypto community will also be putting up a fight.
Some observers have even put up rewards for leads, highlighting the seriousness of the allegations.
At the same time, influencers’ coordinated responses, especially from KOLs in China, are deemed suspicious of a paid promotion or undisclosed token allocations.
At the same time, early investors, such as large exchanges and market makers, are said to already be sitting 300x gains; critics note that with this much profit on the line, these parties have little incentive to make good on those losses.
In case you’re wondering why CEXs aren’t stopping the massive and painfully obvious scam pump and dump of $LAB:
OKX, Gate, KuCoin, Mirana (venture arm of Bybit), GSR as their market maker: they’re all part of it.
They’re sitting on a 323x of their early investment right now. So… pic.twitter.com/1YaPiki0YV
— Simon Dedic (@sjdedic) May 14, 2026
A Broader Industry Problem
The episode with LAB is far from unique, it points to a broader phenomenon in the crypto space.
Projects are ever more reliant on shadowy tokenomics, private agreements and centralized exchange collusion to pump prices. This may provide short-term advantages, but it destroys long-term trust and market sustainability.
With institutions that feigned to be focused on the order and fairness, are instead siphoning off excess value at retail investors costs.
With the potential for valuation excellence to obscure often flawed foundations, the LAB case serves as another warning to better disclose and scrutinise substantial accounts emerging from rapidly evolving markets.
Disclosure: This is not trading or investment advice. Always do your research before buying any cryptocurrency or investing in any services.
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