Baller Ape Club
Summary
Baller Ape Club was a Solana-based NFT project that launched on October 1, 2021, and immediately executed a rug pull, stealing approximately $2.6 million from investors. The project's operator, Le Anh Tuan, a 26-year-old Vietnamese national, was charged by the U.S. Department of Justice on June 30, 2022, with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and conspiracy to commit international money laundering — representing the largest NFT fraud case charged by federal prosecutors at the time.
Connected Entities
1 entities · 10 linked investigationsTimeline(4 events)
2021-10-01
Baller Ape Club NFT mint launched on Solana at 2 SOL per NFT; operators immediately executed a rug pull, stealing approximately $2.6 million and deleting all social media accounts and the project website.
Web3 Is Going Great; TRM Labs; DOJ indictment2022-01-11
The same group of developers allegedly executed a third rug pull under the name 'Big Daddy Ape Club,' stealing approximately $1.2 million shortly after its mint.
Web3 Is Going Great2022-06-30
U.S. Department of Justice, through the Central District of California and HSI Baltimore, announced criminal charges against Le Anh Tuan for conspiracy to commit wire fraud and conspiracy to commit international money laundering in connection with the Baller Ape Club scheme.
U.S. Department of Justice press release2022-07-05
Media and legal commentary describe the Baller Ape Club indictment as the second-ever federal criminal prosecution of an NFT rug pull and the largest by dollar amount charged to date.
NouNFT; Decrypt; CoinGeekDecision Log
- hash: 3PMPLzh7o2RgnP1HbeZbNLHbuD7fSvoK14sEh5hFHWkB
This investigation is cryptographically anchored to the Solana blockchain and source URLs are archived via the Internet Archive.
model: claude-code-investigator
generated: 5/31/2026, 6:06:06 PM
last updated: 5/31/2026, 6:06:09 PM
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