Pudgy Penguins bets $500K on Vegas Sphere — PENGU still down 85%

The price of Pudgy Penguins’ PENGU token is down 85% despite a $500,000 ad deal with the Las Vegas Sphere.

Pudgy Penguins announced on Saturday that it had secured an advertising spot on the sphere, but this news only moved the token upwards by 6%.

A spot on the Las Vegas Sphere was hyped up to be a “to the moon” event back when another project, dogwifhat (WIF), tried and failed to secure itself a spot.

WIF raised over $700,000 for the promo, but it was later mired in confusion about whether or not it had ever actually been officially agreed upon.

To make matters worse, refunds for fundraisers were announced on April Fools Day.

The Pudgy Penguin NFT brand will appear on the sphere on December 24 and reportedly run for a few days, so it remains to be seen if this will bring a spike in performance.

PENGU’s first birthday marked with red candles

It’s also the first birthday of the PENGU token tomorrow. The project launched on December 17, 2024 with an all-time high of $0.0684 according to CoinGecko.

In the five months that followed, PENGU fell by 94% to a low of $0.00385. It then reached a high of $0.0430 by July, before tumbling 76% to today’s price of $0.0101.

Overall, since its launch, the token is down 85%.

The price of PENGU since December 17, 2024, shown by CoinGecko.

Read more: WIF fundraiser says Vegas Sphere refunds will start on April Fools

PENGU’s price action also seems to correlate with bitcoin’s this year, dipping and rising roughly in tandem.

Pudgy Penguin is desperate to get kids hooked on NFTs

Pudgy Penguins is known for a collection of 8,888 NFTs it launched back in July 2021. The firm has since expanded its horizons to subtly advertise its crypto products to children and center its goals on IP expansion.

It’s partnered with the kids candy Pez, the Care Bears, and the collectible toy brand BE@RBRICK, to name just a few of its collaborations.

The Care Bear partnership features a $60 plushie keychain that comes in a “blind box.” This format keeps the contents of the box hidden, a gimmick that’s often compared to gambling.

Read more: You’re not gonna make $50K in PENGU by buying and returning Pudgy toys

As part of the collab, buyers are encouraged to spend almost $300 to guarantee a Pudgy Penguin keychain while a background countdown ticks down before the sale ends.

Indeed, many of Pudgy Penguins’ products are sold in short windows that are advertised with buzz terms like “highly” and “ultra” limited in order to generate a sense of scarcity.

It also created the game Pudgy Party, essentially a carbon copy of the hit platformer Fall Guys, but with an added secondary market of buying and selling in-game rewards that tries to generate a sense of scarcity around its products.

This is all in aid of onboarding the public into buying its token or NFTs. The floor price of Pudgy’s Penguins NFTs is also down 87% since its all-time high coincided with the launch of PENGU.