Ranger Finance
Last changed 2026-10-10 · Score recalculated — Rescored under Scoring v2, the published formula (avoid.net/scoring): 22 → 41. Problems weighed by who is responsible: the subject's own conduct −24, concerns that are not fraud −6.4, problems around the subject, caused by others −2.4; legitimacy credit long-running +4, regulated +5. Version history →
Why this score
| Every page starts at | 65 |
| The subject's own conduct | -24 |
| Concerns that are not fraud | -6.4 |
| Problems around it, caused by others | -2.4 |
| Long-running | +4 |
| Regulated | +5 |
| Sum | 41 |
Score: 41/100 (kept between 0 and 100)
How scoring works →Summary
Ranger Finance was a Solana-based perpetual contract aggregator that raised $1.9M in seed funding in January 2025 and launched its RNGR token in January 2026. Within two months of token launch, community governance voted to liquidate the project treasury following allegations that the team made materially misleading claims about trading volume and revenue during its ICO. The project formally shut down in May 2026 after the treasury liquidation and approximately $900,000 in exposure from the DPRK-linked Drift Protocol exploit left operations unsustainable, with employees and vendors not fully compensated.
Connected Entities
8 entities · 60 linked investigations- Citrine Sleet / AppleJeus→mentioned with→Drift Protocol(80%)
- Drift Protocol→mentioned with→Citrine Sleet / AppleJeus(80%)
- Ranger Finance→mentioned with→Drift Protocol(80%)
- Ranger Finance→mentioned with→Citrine Sleet / AppleJeus(80%)
- Solana→mentioned with→Drift Protocol(80%)
- Drift→mentioned with→Solana(80%)
- Citrine Sleet / AppleJeus→mentioned with→Solana(60%)
- Jupiter Exchange→mentioned with→Solana(80%)
- Ranger Finance→mentioned with→Drift(85%)
- Ranger Finance→mentioned with→Phemex(60%)
- + 7 more
Connected Through
8 shared actors · 451 investigationsDistinct actors this investigation shares with others — holders, traders, and named parties. Shared infrastructure (exchanges, pools) is excluded.
- □Solanaorganization
- ♦KuCointoken
- ⌂Drift Protocolprotocol
- □Driftorganization
Timeline(11 events)
February 2024
Ranger Finance launches Ranger Points Season 1 airdrop farming program, distributing 500,000 points per week to traders and referrers.
12 December 2024
CoinDesk profiles Ranger Finance as Solana's first perpetuals aggregator; founders Barrett Williams and FA2 describe plans for institutional-grade order routing.
23 January 2025
Ranger Finance closes $1.9M seed round led by RockawayX at a $30M valuation, with 9 institutional investors participating.
6 January 2026
RNGR public token sale launches on MetaDAO, targeting a $6M raise at $0.60 per token.
10 January 2026
RNGR token generation event (TGE) occurs; token begins trading with initial market cap of approximately $6.74M.
3 March 2026
RNGR token holders publicly challenge Ranger Finance over alleged misleading ICO projections; a liquidation proposal is submitted through MetaDAO governance.
5 March 2026
MetaDAO community passes proposal to liquidate Ranger Finance; 5,047,250 USDC is released from treasury and liquidity pools for distribution to RNGR holders at approximately $0.75-0.82 per token.
April 2026
Drift Protocol, a key integration partner of Ranger Finance, is exploited for approximately $285 million in a DPRK-attributed social engineering attack.
2 April 2026
Elliptic and TRM Labs attribute the Drift Protocol exploit to North Korean state-sponsored hackers (UNC4736). Ranger Finance's approximately $900,000 exposure confirmed.
14 May 2026
Co-founder Barrett Williams announces gradual shutdown of Ranger Finance on X, citing financial pressures, failed fundraising, treasury liquidation, and Drift exploit exposure. Acknowledges project should have shut down earlier; notes some employees and vendors were not fully compensated.
15 May 2026
Multiple crypto news outlets (CryptoTimes, Phemex, KuCoin) report on Ranger Finance's wind-down announcement.
Decision Log
- slot 455360689 · hash 3TDVQ1YXwfeqUPt2eeWCWHGvU1sjMSdPs5WWJYCkMJA5
- slot 422312346 · hash FAVuVGAHmQScUMHz1xKeZiaq1pyEZDM94EE4hA2VbS1c
This investigation is cryptographically anchored to the Solana blockchain (2 decisions). 14 of 15 cited source URLs have an Internet Archive snapshot.
model: claude-sonnet-4-6
generated: 5/21/2026, 6:46:22 PM
last updated: 10/10/2026, 6:41:36 PM
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