Stablecoin DEX Saddle Finance hacked for $10 million

Saddle Finance, a decentralized exchange for trading stablecoins, was hacked in a DeFi exploit today.

The unknown hacker carried out the exploit at 07:40 AM UTC and netted over $10 million in ether cryptocurrency, according to on-chain data.

Saddle Finance confirmed the incident, saying its team was investigating a "possible exploit." 

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A smart contract audit firm called BlockSec was the first to notify Saddle. Interestingly, BlockSec was able to rescue $3.8 million from the exploiters with an "internal system" that can detect and front-run hacking incidents using off-chain arbitrage bots called flashbots, it told The Block in a Twitter message.

"The project was taken for around 4,900 ether ($13.8 million). Among them, 1,360 ether ($3.8 million) was rescued by us," BlockSec said.

Still, the hacker made off with more than $10 million in ETH from Saddle’s liquidity pools. Saddle Finance said it was in the process of recovering the $3.8 million from BlockSec.

About Author

Vishal Chawla is The Block’s crypto ecosystems editor and has spent over six years covering tech protocols, cybersecurity, artificial intelligence and cloud computing. Vishal likes to delve deep into blockchain intricacies to ensure readers are well-informed about the continuously evolving crypto landscape. He is also a staunch advocate for rigorous security practices in the space. Before joining The Block, Vishal held positions at IDG ComputerWorld, CIO, and Crypto Briefing. He can be reached on Twitter at @vishal4c and via email at [email protected]