What gets added
A token enters the Graveyard when it meets one or more of these criteria:- Circulating supply = $0 — the issuer has wound down the contract or all tokens have been burned.
- Persistent depeg — the token has traded significantly below its peg for an extended period with no recovery path.
- Issuer discontinued — the issuer has publicly deprecated the token (e.g. BUSD after Paxos stopped minting).
- Protocol collapse — the backing mechanism failed catastrophically (e.g. Terra/UST, Iron Finance).
Failure types
| Type | Description | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| algo_collapse | Algorithmic mechanism broke — death spiral or bank run depleted reserves. | UST, ESD, Iron Finance |
| depeg | Persistent price break without full recovery, often with remaining supply. | MIM (partial), BEAN |
| discontinued | Issuer voluntarily ceased minting; tokens still circulate at reduced liquidity. | BUSD, HUSD |
| exploit | Smart contract exploit drained backing or minted unbacked tokens. | Various bridge tokens |
| regulatory | Regulatory action forced shutdown or redemption freeze. | Various |
Column definitions
| Column | Description |
|---|---|
| Peak / Cause / Year | Peak market cap when the token was alive, the failure type label, and the year it failed. |
| Supply | $0 / dead = contract wound down. Otherwise shows remaining circulating supply. |
| Current Price | Last oracle price. ‘Stale oracle’ = trading stopped; the displayed price is frozen at last trade, not live. |
| Original Peg | The peg the token was designed to track (usually $1.00). |
| Loss | Percentage loss from peg: (peg − price) / peg × 100. Dead tokens show ’—’. |
Can tokens leave the Graveyard?
Rarely. A token is reinstated to the main overview only if: the peg is fully restored with genuine market liquidity, the original protocol resumes operation (not a rebranded successor), and the supply returns to a meaningful level. In practice, once a token enters the Graveyard it stays — the data serves as a permanent historical record.Why keep tracking dead tokens?
- Historical price data from failed tokens trains and validates the depeg risk model.
- The warning signs (liquidity erosion, supply velocity, pool imbalance) appear in Graveyard tokens days to weeks before collapse — the same signals DEWS monitors today.
- Total peak value destroyed ($XB+) provides context for the stakes of stablecoin risk monitoring.