Source: Wangarian

Compiled by: Odaily Planet Daily Golem

Editor's note: On January 15, the well-known trader Eugene Ng Ah Sio was exposed by user @MiyaHedge on the X platform, saying that he is Darryl Wang (@0xWangarian), co-founder of Tangent Ventures, and a seed round investor in ENA tokens. Previously, Eugene's account had publicly "called" ENA and multiple tokens many times. Given his true identity as a VC, Darryl Wang was accused of various illegal acts such as suspected fraud or insider trading.

In the face of numerous accusations, Darryl Wang published a long article today in response, stating that Eugene Ng Ah Sio (@0xENAS) is indeed his personal account. He also refuted the allegations of selling undisclosed VC quotas, pumping up shipments, charging for publicity, and falsifying transaction records.

Odaily Planet Daily now summarizes the key points of its response as follows for readers to quickly understand.

Opening an anonymous account is for security reasons

Darryl Wang said that the original intention of creating the Eugene Ng Ah Sio (@0xENAS) account was to fulfill a personal challenge and make his trading gains and losses transparent so that he would not be influenced by preconceived notions and judged by elitism.

But like many people, Darryl Wang decided not to disclose his identity for personal safety reasons, because he knew the risks of publicizing large transactions and exposing himself to the public eye, especially the security risks. Therefore, as his fans continued to grow, he set the initially public API to private and switched his content to sharing trading strategies and monthly summaries.

Now, because of the "human flesh search" and some false but provocative accusations, his personal privacy and the safety of those around him are threatened. Darryl Wang said that he can no longer operate the account anonymously, so he decided to respond positively to the accusations of the community, namely:

  • Touting undisclosed VC allocations and using the influence of Eugene’s account to market to his followers;
  • Using the Eugene account to use fans to increase sales;
  • Promoting certain tokens through the Eugene account for a fee;
  • Forged Eugene’s transaction records, the source of transaction funds and the VC and family behind it.

Clarification on the Secret Sale of VC Token Allocations

Only 2 of the tokens traded by individuals overlap with Tangent

Darryl Wang said that Eugene's account was managed by him alone and had nothing to do with Tangent's angel investment. Jason, the partner in charge of angel investment, had no control over his transactions and tweets.

Of the 100+ tokens Eugene has posted trading on since the account was created, only 2 happened to overlap with Tangent’s angel investments, but extra care is taken to ensure that whenever information about token prices is posted on Eugene’s account, it does not have any impact on any angel investments.

The Ethena team also does not know Eugene's true identity

Regarding the recent allegations that it exited an undisclosed VC angel investment and disguised it as a liquid position that Eugene did not actually establish. Darryl Wang stated that neither he nor Tangent exited any part of these investments. Tangent partner Jason met with Ethena's founders in mid-2023, and Tangent's angel investment department invested in Ethena in July 2023 and then again in February 2024. These investments come with multi-year lock-up periods and are publicly traceable. Given that all private placement investments are locked up, Tangent cannot sell any angel round quotas, so Darryl Wang stated that any allegations of selling tokens are not only fabricated, but also functionally impossible.

In the third quarter of 2024, the Eugene account published an article about the liquidity advantages of ENA. Darryl Wang stated that he had clearly stated in the article that he had gone long on ENA, but in order not to expose his identity, he did not make any comments or statements about Tangent's angel investment in the article.

Tangent co-founder confession: Becoming Eugene is to prove...

 Excerpted from the Ethena article, Darryl Wang made his own financial disclosure

The Ethena team also does not know the true identity behind Eugene and did not participate in the creation of the article. All the information provided in the article is publicly available and can be verified by anyone. Darryl Wang said that the article clearly shows how he thinks about the problem from a liquidity perspective, and even outlines the main risks that Ethena faces from VC unlocking starting in April 2025.

Tangent co-founder confession: Becoming Eugene is to prove...

 Excerpt from Ethena article, highlighting the risks VC unlocking poses to ENA

Tangent has not exited any of its angel investments in Ethena

Darryl Wang said that he established a position that is about 100 times the amount of Tangent's investment in the angel investment stage. At the time of article publication, ENA price was $0.28. Today, its price has risen to $0.90, about three times the price at the time of article publication.

At the same time, Darryl Wang said that the entire article is about the liquidity position he established independently. From the time the article was published to today, Tangent has not withdrawn from any angel investment in Ethena.

When Jason quoted Eugene's tweet, he fully disclosed Tangent's position on Ethena, but Darryl Wang asked not to publish his real identity for the sake of privacy. At the same time, Darryl Wang said that in hindsight, this was a wrong judgment and he deeply apologized for any deliberate distortion of the facts.

In Eugene’s tweet about the token SEI, Darryl Wang stated that it was last mentioned in a LTF deal setup in December 2023, with the earliest VC unlock occurring nine months later in August 2024.

Only tweet about tokens that follow their principles

As the Eugene account gained more and more followers, Darryl Wang said he followed two guidelines when posting tweets about tokens through the account:

  • They must list on Binance Perpetual Contracts to ensure sufficient liquidity;
  • Never use immediate robot-related price pressure as liquidity for selling.

Darryl Wang said that he had violated the first rule and tried to share investment ideas about a certain on-chain token, but the result was not ideal. Since then, he has been avoiding sharing his views on on-chain tokens.

At the same time, Darryl Wang said frankly that because of his high trading frequency and short trading duration, it means that if you follow his trades, it is very likely that he has closed his position before you exit. That is why he often reminds people how much risk they will take if they choose to copy trades, and he has always been transparent about the scale of his losses.

Never participated in "KOL transactions"

Darryl Wang said he had never used the Eugene account to accept any transaction or structure that collected funds or tokens to promote cryptocurrencies. During this cycle, many so-called "KOL transactions" have emerged, which provide extremely short and predatory unlocking periods, which are significantly different from the venture capital transactions that Tangent participated in, which usually require tokens to have a lock-up period of at least 3 to 4 years, and equity to be longer.

To clarify, Darryl Wang said that Tangent, Jason, and himself have not participated in any "KOL transactions" since the Eugene account was established. Tangent's angel investment department has supported multiple startups, all of which have been publicly announced. When Eugene mentioned certain tokens on Twitter, it was entirely because of the attractiveness of the transaction itself, not to attract interest in angel investment, not to mention that more than 80% of Tangent's venture capital investments do not have tokens.

At the same time, Darryl Wang also clarified that he had never personally or instructed Jason to withdraw from any angel investment in Tangent after he shared any relevant content, and these insinuations were completely fabricated for defamation.

Self-narrated history of success

The whistleblower may have ulterior motives

Darryl Wang revealed that in the past 12 hours, photos of his family have been circulated to support threats based on false accusations, which has caused his family great pain. At the same time, he emphasized that exposing his personal information is one thing, but publicly endangering his family and using deliberately inaccurate and provocative language is another.

So in the process of preparing this response, he also obtained information about the identity of the original poster and another party involved, suspecting they had other motives, but did not ethically want to share that information.

Getting rich through DeFi

Regarding the allegation that the trading funds of Eugene's account were funded by his family, Darryl Wang shared his history of making a fortune:

Darryl Wang was exposed to cryptocurrency during the DeFi summer of 2020. In October 2020, he quit his investment banking job, invested $100,000 in savings in cryptocurrency, and joined DeFiance Capital as a junior analyst.

Darryl Wang accumulated capital through trading and “shitcoining” (high-risk token trading) with other degens during the 2020-2021 bull run, and ended the cycle with a profit when FTX collapsed, with enough funds to provide initial funding for Tangent without the need for external investors.

It was also at that time that Darryl Wang created the Eugene account as a personal account, initially without the involvement or help of the Tangent team, and what happened next is now known to everyone.

Darryl Wang said that whether the public believes it or not, the fact is that Eugene manages a pool of funds funded by himself personally (not external funds) and does not receive any external services or solicit any capital.

Tangent co-founder confession: Becoming Eugene is to prove...

 Eugene’s historical trading performance from January 2023 to January 2025 (Source: https://app.coinmarketman.com/dashboard/leaderboard)

Conclusion: I wanted to be an anonymous legend

Darryl Wang founded Tangent with Jason, believing that he would use his trading talents and Jason's angel investment skills to become a long-term supporter of the industry. Eugene is his personal creation, hoping to use it to trade with personal capital, independent decision-making, and get rid of any restrictions.

Darryl Wang said he had hoped to give back to others like many anonymous legends do, sharing his ideas and process.

Although he has always been transparent about his profits and losses, some people still choose to target and discredit him. Ironically, Darryl Wang said that he created the Eugene account in part to prove that a person's background is not important, what matters is your process and trading discipline, but now his background has become the main attack point for those who try to defame him.

Tangent co-founder confession: Becoming Eugene is to prove...

At the same time, Darryl Wang said this would be his first and last response to these accusations, and he is fully prepared to respond accordingly if the other party believes they have legal grounds.