Stolen Binance Funds Drive DeFi Protocol Revenue Gains: Investigator
Several DeFi protocols saw their revenues surge as North Korean hackers laundered stolen Binance funds through their platforms.
Several DeFi protocols seem to have benefited from North Korean hackers moving hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of crypto they stole from Binance on October 30. On-chain investigations suggest that the laundering operation generated more than $100,000 in protocol revenue per day for five services.
Top Revenue Earners
Blockchain investigator dethective posted a breakdown of protocol revenues linked to wallets associated with the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), with SunSwap, THORChain, Relay, Symbiosis, and Chainflip making the most money.
Per the data, SunSwap generated $29,697 attributed to the hacker, while THORChain, in second place, earned $28,184. Relay earned slightly more than $23,000, while Symbiosis made just over half of that. Chainflip wrapped up the top five, collecting $7,433 to bring the total for them to $101,144.
Revenue Surges
The increase in revenue was most pronounced at THORChain and Relay, whose daily revenues went up 2,229% and 1,954%, respectively, compared with typical October levels. SunSwap recorded an 815% jump, while Symbiosis and Chainflip posted gains of 358% and 194%.
The figures are based on Elliptic and FBI hack lists, as well as some additional wallets that had been traced on-chain.
Funds Movement
A separate investigation by SomaXBT traced some $242 million moved through the Tron network in two days, a small chunk of the $628 million the attacker had originally stolen on the network, with Tether freezing over $378 million of it in USDT.
THORChain was the hacker's largest exit route for that $242 million, as they used it to move over $48 million. The hackers ultimately received $42.7 million, having lost $5.7 million to fees and slippage, with interfaces facilitating those transactions collecting about $95,000 in affiliate fees.
On November 1, the FBI formally blamed the Binance hack on North Korea's TraderTraitor, and Relay handled approximately $48 million into Ethereum, Bitcoin, and the Lighter decentralized exchange. SomaXBT also traced $32.1 million and $16.0 million processed through Chainflip and Symbiosis, respectively.
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