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Major crypto protocol accumulates over $112 million in debt due to hackers., 2026/03/19 15:07:47
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The largest decentralized lending platform on the BNB Chain, Venus Protocol, has accumulated over $112 million in unsecured debt due to several significant hacking incidents. The most recent breach occurred on March 15.
The latest attack on the platform via the THE token from the Thena project resulted in an asset-backed debt for Venus amounting to $2.15 million. An investigation by blockchain analysts at PeckShield revealed that a month prior, an unidentified individual withdrew 7,400 ETH from TornadoCash and borrowed $9.9 million to acquire THE. Subsequently, they donated 36.1 million THE tokens directly to the vTHE contract, circumventing the supply cap and inflating the exchange rate by 3.81 times.
Analysts from PeckShield also noted significant activity from major holders of the Venus governance token (XVS). For instance, Justin Sun, the founder of Tron and one of the top five XVS holders, deposited 621,071 XVS (approximately $1.95 million) on the HTX exchange on March 16, the day following the attack.
Additionally, PeckShield highlighted that an address linked to the October 2022 BNB Chain bridge hack remains among the top 16 XVS holders, possessing around 135,000 XVS valued at $421,000.
Venus began accumulating debt in 2021 when price manipulation of the platform’s governance token XVS resulted in an unsecured debt exceeding $95 million. In 2022, the collapse of the Terra project added another $14 million. Later that same year, stolen BNB from the BNB Chain bridge hack was used to borrow $150 million in stablecoins through Venus. In September 2025, a phishing attack on one of Venus’s users compelled the platform to reimburse the victim $13 million.
Following the breach on March 15 of this year, Venus suspended trading on several markets. Trading has yet to resume.
In 2026, several lending crypto protocols announced their closure. Due to the inability to restore liquidity after hacking incidents, Remora Markets and ZeroLend ceased operations. Another crypto lender, BlockFills, declared bankruptcy.
