After amassing more than 50 billion social media views and placing toys on the shelves of Walmart and Target stores across the country, Ethereum NFT project Pudgy Penguins is launching a token.

The news sent Pudgy Penguins’ floor price skyrocketing, surpassing $100,000 and becoming the second-largest profile picture project (PFP) of all NFTs.

“The job of a founder in crypto is to achieve maximum excitement,” Luca Netz, IP owner of Pudgy Penguins, said in a video interview with crypto personality ThreadGuy.

As excitement reigns in the Pudgy Penguin ecosystem, find out everything you need to know about the upcoming token PENGU, launching on December 17th Solana.

What is PENGU?

PENGU is the Pudgy Penguins ecosystem token set to launch on the Solana blockchain. It will have a total supply of 88.88 billion PENGU tokens, 25.9% of which will be reserved for members of the Pudgy Penguins ecosystem via an upcoming airdrop claim.

“By launching PENGU on Solana, Pudgy Penguins is growing by reaching an entirely new audience.” said Igloo Incthe parent company of Pudgy Penguin on X (formerly known as Twitter).

Although the token will launch on Solana, it will eventually expand to Ethereum and Abstract, the consumer-focused Ethereum Layer 2 scaling network built by Igloo Inc.

For Netz, the PENGU token offers the millions of Pudgy Penguin fans around the world a better connection to the brand, suggesting that tokenization is “alignment” at its core.

When will PENGU be released?

PENGU will launch on December 17, 2024. An official launch time has not been announced, but launch is expected in the morning ET.

Official links and claim details will only be shared and announced via the Pudgy Penguins account on X.

Several copycat tokens are already trading in an attempt to lure investors into buying an asset with the same or similar name, but the real token is not yet available at the time of writing.

Who will receive the PENGU airdrop?

More than 88 billion PENGU tokens will be in circulation on the Solana blockchain, divided across a handful of holder categories, as outlined in the Pudgy Penguins announcement.

Decipher has reached out to Pudgy Penguins for additional clarity on details related to token distribution. The following numbers are estimates based on an information graphic from Pudgy Penguins.

25.9%: Pudgy Community

The largest allocation of PENGU tokens is reserved for the Pudgy Penguins community, including but not limited to Pudgy Penguins NFT holders, Lil Pudgys and Pudgy Rods (also known as Rogs).

While no specific quotas have been announced yet, the largest allocation is expected to go to holders of the original Pudgy Penguins NFTs – which are by far the most valuable – followed by Lil Pudgys and Rogs.

Project manager Luca Netz confirms that no snapshot will be taken to capture holders, and instead those who own the assets at the time of token generation will gain access to PENGU.

24.12%: Other communities

The next largest bucket of PENGU tokens will be reserved for other communities in Web3 and potentially beyond, with the expectation of attracting 5 million new Pudgy Penguin community members, the announcement graphic states.

Communities that have been offered the “Elite” role in the Abstract Discord are also eligible for a PENGU claim, provided they have claimed the role and completed a form in the Discord before the deadline.

The list includes the following communities, among others: Plooshies, Doodles, Claynosaurz, Memeland, BoDoggos, Bitcoin Puppets, Nodemonkes, Azuki, Bored Ape Yacht Club, Mutant Ape Yacht Club, Wassies, Goblintown, Wonky Stonks, The Plague, Mocaverse, Onchain Gaias and holders of at least 1 billion Mog Coin (MOG).

Netz also noted that Pudgy Toys buyers interacted with him online Chubby world Gaming platform and collected “Chubby characteristics”– or attributes to equip their virtual penguins – would also be eligible for PENGU. Pudgy Toys owners can access Pudgy World by scanning a QR code included with their toy. After scanning the code, users are instructed to “collect the features and wait for Abstract Bridge to go live,” according to Netz.

17.8%: Pudgy Penguins team

Current and former employees of the Pudgy Penguins ecosystem will take the third largest stake in PENGU, receiving nearly 18% of the token after a one-year lock-up period and a three-year lock-up period. During token distribution, a cliff typically prevents a user from selling or transferring tokens.

12.35%: Liquidity pools

A portion of the PENGU supply will be put on hold to provide sufficient liquidity for active trading of the token.

11.48%: Companies

Igloo Inc., the parent company of Pudgy Penguins, will receive 11.48% of the PENGU token, subject to the same one-year cut and three-year lock-up period as Pudgy Penguin employees.

4%: common good

Four percent of the PENGU token supply is earmarked for charitable purposes. Although not officially described, Pudgy Penguins has undertaken charitable initiatives over the past year his Pudgy Kindness campaignsSend money and help underrated streamers go viral on social media.

4%: Spread

Another small percentage of PENGU is earmarked for efforts to expand the Pudgy Penguins brand, possibly through listings on centralized exchanges or brand marketing efforts.

As part of the launch on Binance, 3% of the PENGU supply will be distributed to participants in Binance’s HODLer program.

0.35%: FTT holders

The smallest allocation of the PENGU token is reserved for FTT token holders. FTT is the native token of the infamous FTX exchange, which filed for bankruptcy and ceased operations following its collapse in November 2022.

The token saw a brief surge to nearly $4 on the day of the PENGU announcement – ​​a near year-long price peak – but has since declined. No official retention criteria have been announced at this time.

How to claim PENGU

According to a post on

It is expected that users will first need to verify ownership of Pudgy Penguins or related assets and then connect a Solana wallet to claim PENGU.

Where to trade PENGU?

PENGU will go live for spot trading on popular crypto exchange Binance on Tuesday, December 17th at 9 a.m. ET.

So far, it is the only crypto exchange to announce trading in the PENGU token, but others are likely to follow. Additionally, users can trade PENGU via Solana-based decentralized exchanges (DEXs).

Premarket trading

While PENGU is not yet live, pre-market trading has already begun on platforms such as Whales Market. At the time of writing, PENGU is trading for $0.05 with a lifetime volume of over $1 million. At a price of $0.05, PENGU would have a fully diluted valuation of more than $4.4 billion, ranking just outside the top 50 tokens on this metric, according to CoinGecko

Historically, pre-market trading is very volatile and does not allow predictions about future prices. However, sometimes it ends up pretty close to the mark, as seen with NFT marketplace Magic Eden’s ME token.

Edited by Andrew Hayward

Editor’s Note: This story was originally published on December 13, 2024. It was last updated with new details on December 16th.