Thorchain’s RUNE Token Tumbles After 2nd Exploit in 2 Weeks

thor-mosh-3
23 July 2021

Thorchain’s token, RUNE, tumbled in digital-asset markets after the blockchain suffered an exploit for the second time in two weeks, this one costing about $8 million. 

The RUNE price was $3.58 as of press time, down 25% over the past 24 hours, in the worst performance among digital assets tracked by Messari with a market capitalization of at least $500 million. The token has lost some 80% since hitting an all-time high price in May..

Thorchain said late Thursday it was hit by an exploit, reported to have cost around $8 million. Last week, the protocol was drained of around 4,000 ether ($8.2 million) in another incident. 

Thorchain, now with a market capitalization of $841 million, was founded in 2018 and is a decentralized liquidity protocol that allows for swapping native assets between different blockchains. 

Regarding the latest incident, Thorchain told CoinDesk that a hacker deployed a custom contract that tricked the network’s Bifrost Protocol into receiving a deposit of fake assets. It then processed a refund of real assets to the hacker. 

The RUNE token is still up by 178% year-to-date, handily outperforming bitcoin‘s 11% return. 

Disclosure
The leader in news and information on cryptocurrency, digital assets and the future of money, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk is an independent operating subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which invests in cryptocurrencies and blockchain startups.