Harmony is shutting down its blockchain, launched in 2019, and migrating its native token, ONE, to Ethereum as an ERC-20 asset. The team attributed this decision to threats from state actors and AI agents. Validators are permitted to power down their nodes starting from 7 a.m. Pacific on September 10.
The network's closure follows a series of security incidents. In 2022, a breach of the Horizon Bridge resulted in the loss of nearly $99.6 million. More recently, in August, an exploit minted approximately 4 billion ONE, representing about 26% of the total supply, which drove the token price to a record low of $0.0005735.
Token holders will receive new tokens on Ethereum via an airdrop after a balance snapshot at the final block, requiring no manual claim. However, users must exit all smart contracts, including liquidity pools and multisig safes, before September 10. A pool of $1.372 million is allocated to pay governors who sign an agreement to remain.
Future token emissions will fund an AI video venture called The Remix Economy. This project is described as an open library of prompts and assets for AI agents to create stories. Harmony plans to subsidize hardware for operators for one year, while requiring them to stake tokens. The project expects millions of remixes per day.
As of Monday, ONE traded near $0.00074, which is approximately 29% above its August 12 record low. The token's market value is currently near $11 million, placing it outside the top 1,000 tokens by market capitalization.
