Cronos, the blockchain ecosystem related to Crypto.com, wants to bring back 70 billion CRO tokens it burned in 2021 in a strange proposal that has largely left its community members flummoxed .

The now-live governance proposal aims to restore its original 100 billion token supply under a strategy dubbed “The New Golden Age for Cronos.”

The original burn slashed CRO’s supply from 100 billion to 30 billion, a move hailed at the time as a masterstroke to boost value — one that helped bump CRO prices from 6 cents to 25 cents in a few weeks.

Now, Cronos wants to reverse course and reissue the tokens into a “Strategic Reserve” escrow wallet to be vested monthly over 10 years.

The motive is a $5 billion push (at current CRO prices of 8 cents) to cement U.S. crypto dominance, fund ecosystem growth, and launch a CRO ETF. The team expects the move to “onboard billions” of potential users and integrate CRO with institutional liquidity pools, but not everyone’s buying the hype.

Community reactions to the proposal have been swift and largely critical. The reissuance threatens to dilute value, a sore point for a community celebrating the 2021 burn as a moonshot moment.

“This is the opposite of what #CROfam wants,” user @WalkingTall101 said. “The 2021 burn was a landmark moment for #CRO, a signal of commitment to scarcity and growth. Undoing it now feels like a step backward, diluting our trust and the chain’s potential.”

“A burn is a burn, burnt tokens shouldn’t be brought back to life. I’m almost never against anything happening on Cronos, but today, I’m against it, big time!,” the well-followed Crypto.com ambassador @Wyll_BBK posted.

Still, the proposal’s fate hinges on a governance vote, with 86% of votes against, 8.6% abstaining to participate and just 4.68% voting in favor as of Monday (though this can quickly change if an influential player votes in favor closer to the end date).

The vote runs until Mar.17. CRO prices are up 8% in the past 24 hours, in line with a broader market jump.