RAY Fails to Recover After Hacker Drains Decentralized Exchange for $2.2 Million

RAY, the native token of Solana-based decentralized exchange Raydium, has failed to recover after it was dumped on the news that the exchange was hacked on Friday.

The token is currently trading at $0.154, a 3% increase from its low of $0.149 on Friday, according to data from CoinGecko. Before the hack, RAY traded as high as $0.214.

RAY is down 99% from an all-time high of $16.83, which it reached in September 2021.

Raydium’s total value locked (TVL) was also dumped on the news. It went from almost $48 million to around $32 million, a 34% drawdown, according to data from DefiLlama. It plummeted even harder when FTX crumbled from $112 million to $50 million.

Raydium’s token was dumped following the news that, on Friday, an unidentified hacker attacked the exchange and stole $2.2 million worth of tokens.

The hacker drained several Raydium liquidity pools and transferred tokens like wrapped USDC, wrapped ETH, and others. SOL comprised $1.6 million – or 72% – of the stolen funds.

While the hacker has yet to be identified, it seems like they used one of the protocol owner’s private keys to hack the exchange. However, it’s unknown how they obtained access to them.

Raydium is one of the most trusted and respected decentralized exchanges on Solana. However, some protocols and liquidity providers sounded the alarm bell after the news broke. 

For example, PRISM, a swap aggregator on Solana, announced that it has emptied its PRISM/USDC liquidity pool and encouraged others to do the same. The move is justifiable, especially since the method the hacker gained access to the admin’s private keys remains unknown.

Raydium is one of the last places left on Solana to trade. The fact that it got hacked and that the hacker used one of the protocol owner’s private keys to do so raises multiple questions. Users should be extra careful when choosing where to hold their assets.