Share this article
Sui's Cetus DEX Is Back Online After $223M Exploit
Liquidity pools have been restored to between 85% and 99% of their original levels.
Updated Jun 9, 2025, 1:09 p.m. Published Jun 9, 2025, 11:39 a.m.
Make us preferred on Google
What to know:
- Cetus Protocol resumed operations after a 17-day outage caused by a $223 million exploit, recovering $162 million of stolen funds and pursuing legal action against the attacker.
- Sui compensated Cetus users with a loan to cover initial losses, and liquidity pools have been restored to 85-99% of original levels.
- Cetus’ total value locked rebounded to $124 million. It was $284 million before the exploit.
Sui-based decentralized exchange (DEX) Cetus Protocol is back online following a 17-day outage spurred by last month's $223 million exploit.
The protocol recovered around $162 million worth of stolen funds and is continuing legal action against the attacker, who did not respond to the DEX's requests to negotiate.
STORY CONTINUES BELOW
Don't miss another story.Subscribe to the Crypto Daybook Americas Newsletter today. See all newsletters
Sui stepped in to compensate Cetus for the initial losses, issuing a loan to reimburse impacted users on May 28. DefiLlama data shows that Cetus' total value locked (TVL) was $284 million before the exploit and is now down to $124 million.
The attacker exploited a flaw in Cetus' shared math library contract, tricking the protocol into believing that one token was worth millions of dollars.
Despite attempts to negotiate and come to a settlement, the attacker began laundering funds through coin-mixing service Tornado Cash.
Cetus has refilled the liquidity pools with between 85% to 99% of their initial liquidity, meaning that users can now trade on the platform without exceptional slippage.
The Cetus token (CETUS) has lost 44% of its value over the past month and is down around 1% over the past 24 hours, CoinMarketCap shows.
More For You
Pudgy Penguins is building a multi-vertical consumer IP platform — combining phygital products, games, NFTs and PENGU to monetize culture at scale.
What to know:
Pudgy Penguins is emerging as one of the strongest NFT-native brands of this cycle, shifting from speculative “digital luxury goods” into a multi-vertical consumer IP platform. Its strategy is to acquire users through mainstream channels first; toys, retail partnerships and viral media, then onboard them into Web3 through games, NFTs and the PENGU token.
The ecosystem now spans phygital products (> $13M retail sales and >1M units sold), games and experiences (Pudgy Party surpassed 500k downloads in two weeks), and a widely distributed token (airdropped to 6M+ wallets). While the market is currently pricing Pudgy at a premium relative to traditional IP peers, sustained success depends on execution across retail expansion, gaming adoption and deeper token utility.
More For You
Mesh becomes unicorn, raises $75 million for crypto payments infrastructure
The investment round was led by Dragonfly Capital and included participation from Paradigm, Moderne Ventures, Coinbase Ventures and SBI Investment.
What to know:
- Cryptocurrency payments network Mesh acquired unicorn status with a $75 million Series C funding round that valued the company at $1 billion.
- The fund raise, coupled with the ceremonial significance of Mesh acquiring unicorn status, may demonstrate confidence in crypto infrastructure projects despite a relatively depressed market.
- Mesh said part of the $75 million raise was settled using stablecoins to demonstrate that is infrastructure is "ready for high stakes, real-world use."
Top Stories
