Thorchain halts trading after $10 million cross-chain exploit, RUNE token drops 12%

Decentralized cross-chain liquidity protocol THORChain was exploited for roughly $10.8 million on Friday, with the attack affecting deployments across four different blockchains.

In response, the protocol paused all trading and signing operations, according to on-chain investigator ZachXBT on Telegram.

The attacker's wallets, identified across Bitcoin, Ethereum and BSC, currently hold 3,443 ETH worth $7.77 million, 36.85 BTC worth $2.97 million, and 96.6 BNB worth $66,000, per Arkham Intelligence.

Thorchain's Mimir governance module flipped trading halt and signing halt parameters to active, with a node pause running for approximately 12 hours and 42 minutes from block 26190429.

RUNE, the protocol's native token, dropped 12% on the news.

Thorchain operates as a decentralized cross-chain liquidity network, letting users swap native assets across different blockchains without wrapping or bridging through a centralized intermediary.

Crypto exploits have remained a persistent feature of the industry. In April alone, decentralized perpetual exchange Drift Protocol and liquid restaking protocol KelpDAO together accounted for over $600 million in losses.

Cross-chain bridges and liquidity protocols have historically been the most exploited category in DeFi, with over $2.8 billion in cumulative bridge-related theft since 2021 per Chainalysis.

The protocol has not yet published a post-mortem identifying the specific attack vector.