In the wake of the Mantra scandal, Quinn Thompson, the founder and Chief Investment Officer of Lekker Capital, has once again raised red flags about another RWA project Ondo Finance.
On April 14, Quinn Thompson took to X to issue his renewed warning regarding Ondo Finance (ONDO) in the light of the recent Mantra debacle, stating “In light of the recent Mantra $OM token scam, probably prudent to recirculate this thread on $ONDO in case it saves at least one person from the eventual financial ruin.”
In the post, Thompson resurfaced his earlier thread from March 18, where he asked on-chain investigators to confirm whether Ondo Finance’s Total Value Locked is artificially inflated by the team selling tokens and redirecting the proceeds back into the protocol to create the illusion of organic user adoption.
“Can one of the on-chain investigators confirm for me if it is true that the majority of Ondo’s TVL… is from the team’s selling of $ONDO tokens with the proceeds funneled back into the protocol to give off the appearance of organic growth?” he wrote.
To support his claims, Thompson resurfaced his post from October 2024, where he criticized the project’s $7B fully diluted valuation despite generating no revenue and offering products (USDY and OUSG) that are “just wrappers on Blackrock’s BUIDL.”
He also pointed to the company’s 0.15% take rate—which had been waived until 2025, meaning the protocol was earning no revenue despite its sizable TVL. He argued that once the fee kicks in, users will likely move their funds to BUIDL because it’s safer, cheaper, and has better yields. Even if Ondo does start charging the fee, it would only earn about $975K annually. “That is over a 7,000x FDV / revenue multiple on a near-zero margin business with no moat and increasing competition,” he added.
In response, one user @TimiBot commented, “Thought this was on open secret,” attaching a screenshot of what appears to be a circulated message from a Telegram group. The message outlines the alleged mechanics behind Ondo’s inflated TVL.
This suggests that, while the TVL funds are real, Ondo Finance’s TVL metric is misleading as much of the capital in Ondo’s protocol isn’t fueling DeFi, but is instead parked in tokenized U.S. Treasury Bills, which are low-risk, traditional financial instruments.
To tie it all together, Ondo Finance may be leveraging artificial inflation of TVL by selling their own ONDO and then taking that cash and putting it back into their own protocol. The funds invested in T-Bills are also part of the reported TVL, but they’re not actually being used for DeFi activities like lending, borrowing, or trading. Both of these tactics create a misleading picture of the protocol’s actual adoption.
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