The $WHUF auction by Ethos opened on September 1, 2026, and closed after three days of bidding with $8.4m accepted from 1,560 participants. Ethos says that made it the third largest public token sale of 2026. $WHUF was minted and distributed to sale participants on September 8, and it can’t be transferred until October 8.
If you took part, or are trying to understand what happened, this covers the sale from start to finish: how the auction was set up, when refunds and tokens arrived, the lock period and the burn of unused referral tokens.
How the auction was set up
Ethos announced the auction ahead of time in a post introducing the token with “Hello, Whuffie.” That post set out the main terms:
- Auction on September 1 for 20% of supply
- 85% price guarantee
- $1m starting FDV (fully diluted valuation) and a $99m cap
- Bonuses for Contributor XP and referrals
Registration ran through sale.ethos.network.
September 1: bidding opens
When the auction went live on September 1, Ethos pointed to one feature in particular: every bid was public. A leaderboard showed who was bidding and at what price, and Ethos noted it was already moving within the first hours.
Ethos also flagged one rule. If bidding ran all the way to the cap of roughly $99m FDV, the earliest bids would fill first.
September 4: distribution plans and a wallet reminder
On September 4, Ethos shared the plan for after the sale:
- Refunds for those who were outbid, and tokens for those whose bids cleared, would be distributed on Tuesday, September 8
- Tokens would be locked to just vouching
- Participants would also see all the bonus tokens they’d earned on September 8
Ethos added a reminder: anyone who bid from a wallet separate from the one on their Ethos profile needed to connect that wallet to their Ethos profile to be eligible for bonuses.
September 6: refunds arrive early
Refunds went out two days ahead of schedule, on September 6. They covered participants whose bids didn’t clear and those whose bids were only partially cleared, who received a partial refund.
The refunds are visible onchain at this address on Basescan, processed in eight transactions in total.
September 7: the results
On September 7, Ethos published the final numbers:
- $8.4m accepted
- 1,560 participants
- 3 days of bidding
- 20% of supply sold, compared with 2% for the median 2026 token sale
Ethos described the result as the third largest public token sale of 2026 and shared additional research on how these figures compare with other sales.
Later that day, Ethos clarified the timing for anyone unsure: the token would be generated on September 8, and it would be locked from transferability until October 8.
September 8: TGE and a burn
The token generation event happened on September 8. $WHUF was minted and distributed to all sale participants, and each participant was set to receive an email listing the amount of $WHUF and bonus $WHUF they received.
Not all of the referral pool was claimed. Ethos first said 31% of it was used, then corrected that to 39%. The unused portion, 60,530.73 $WHUF, was burned, reducing total supply by 0.6%.
Onchain records
The token contract is on Base: $WHUF on Basescan. Ethos also published the genesis mint transactions:
- Mint transaction 1
- Mint transaction 2
- Mint transaction 3
- Mint transaction 4
- Mint transaction 5
- Mint transaction 6
- Mint transaction 7
- Mint transaction 8
- Mint transaction 9
Key dates
- September 1: auction opens
- September 6: refunds distributed
- September 7: results published
- September 8: TGE, tokens and bonuses distributed, unused referral tokens burned
- October 8: transfer lock planned to end
This story first appeared on X.
