The Hacker Behind a $45M Exploit Just Bought ETH Dip

As the bearish crypto market lingers, most prominent cryptocurrencies hold significantly low prices, a trend that has not occurred in months.

The hacker behind Pancake Bunny, a decentralized finance (DeFi) project built on the BNB Chain, has used portions of the $45 million stolen to accumulate 2,922 ETH using approximately $7.8 million. Based on ETH’s current market value, the ETH stash is valued above $6.5 million.

Hacker Invests in ETH

On May 19, 2021, the hacker adopted a flash loan attack to exploit Pancake Bunny. The bad actor manipulated the exchange rates for some crypto tokens on the DeFi protocol, stealing about $45 million worth of wrapped BNB (WBNB) from the platform.

The following year, the project’s development team assured users they would be compensated for their losses and the hacker would be tracked. Despite this promise, the project’s social media presence has weaned off, leaving affected users in losses.

With the current market dip, the Pancake Bunny attacker has awakened from a three-year slumber to accumulate ETH. On-chain data shared by the blockchain security firm PeckShield revealed that the hacker swapped 7.8 million DAI stablecoins for ETH using wallets under their custody.

#PeckShieldAlert Our community contributor has detected that the #PancakeBunny exploiter-labeled address aped into $ETH when the market dropped.
The exploiter swapped 7.8M $DAI for 2.922K $ETH.
On May 19, 2021, PancakeBunny’s Bunny Protocol fell victim to a flash loan attack,… pic.twitter.com/wACNvYk0Rn

— PeckShieldAlert (@PeckShieldAlert) August 5, 2024

At press time, the ETH stash remained in the hacker’s wallet.

Why is the Market Dumping?

In only a week, the crypto market has capsized by over 16% to a valuation of $1.85 trillion. The leading crypto asset, BTC, has lost more than 26% of its value and currently trades at $51,400. Earlier today, the cryptocurrency tanked below $50,000.

As mentioned earlier, ETH is not left out in the bearish trends. At the time of writing, the smart contract-enabled cryptocurrency has lost 32.6% of its value within the past week. It currently trades at around $2,200.

Although no singular event is triggering the current market conditions, market experts have shared insights on some factors that may be causing the bearish trends. BitMEX co-founder Arthur Hayes noted earlier today that massive selling pressure from a whale caused the sudden downtrend.