Sahara AI’s SAHARA token plunged roughly 55% on June 9, sliding close to its record low after a sudden, heavy sell-off that sent trading volume surging above $300 million. At the time of writing, SAHARA was trading near $0.01718, with a 24-hour range of $0.01452 to $0.03957.
The project moved quickly to reassure the market. Sahara AI said there were “no security issues” with its token contracts or products, that it had launched an internal review, and was monitoring markets in real time. The team also pushed back on social-media claims that team or investor wallets were responsible, stating explicitly that “no team or investor tokens have been sold or moved.”
A focal point of the controversy was an on-chain transfer of 600 million SAHARA tokens. Sahara AI says that movement was a pre-scheduled deposit into its Chainlink CCIP bridge contract to provide liquidity for a cross-chain bridge between Ethereum and BNB Chain. The team added that another 150 million SAHARA is scheduled for the bridge, and pointed to a verified LockReleaseTokenPool contract on Etherscan as evidence the transfer was bridge-related. Still, the on-chain record does not explain what triggered the market panic or why traders sold.
Market context underlines the token’s volatility. SAHARA’s intraday low of $0.01452 was hovering near its record low of about $0.01355, and the token remains almost 90% below its July 2025 peak of roughly $0.1605. The project’s market capitalization fell to about $58.5 million. Trading volume jumped more than 340% from the prior day, but on-chain data has not made it clear whether the move was driven by a single large holder, multiple accounts, forced liquidations, or broad-based selling.
Sahara AI’s background: the project raised $43 million in a 2024 funding round co-led by Binance Labs (now YZi Labs), Pantera Capital, and Polychain Capital. The token suffered a previous ~60% decline after listings on Binance, Bitget, Upbit, and Bithumb in June 2025. SAHARA has a maximum supply of 10 billion tokens, about 3.4 billion of which are currently circulating. Market data also shows a planned unlock of around 1.03 billion tokens on June 26, though Sahara AI says there is no public evidence linking that scheduled release to the June 9 sell-off.
For now, Sahara AI says it will publish further updates once it can confirm additional information. The precise cause of the dramatic price drop remains unresolved.
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