Written by Nate Kostar, Staff Writer. Reviewed by Robert Lakin, Staff Editor. Ethereum backers pledge up to 30,000 ETH to rsETH recovery after bridge incident
The funding follows a $290 million rsETH bridge exploit that disrupted DeFi markets and triggered a coordinated recovery effort.
Consensys and Ethereum co-founder Joe Lubin have joined DeFi United, committing as much as 30,000 ETH to a recovery effort aimed at restoring rsETH backing after a $290 million bridge exploit triggered widespread disruptions across DeFi.
The initiative, led by participants in Aave DAO, aims to support affected users and stabilize rsETH markets, with governance approvals still pending across involved protocols.
The funding is intended to provide immediate liquidity while governance processes continue, with an eye on limiting disruption across DeFi protocols. Sharplink, a publicly traded Ethereum treasury company, has joined in an advisory role to help structure the recovery plan.
Source: Aave on X
DeFi United was announced April 23 by service providers to Aave DAO, with participants including Lido, EtherFi, Ethena, Mantle and Frax, among others.
The recovery effort follows an April 18 exploit that drained roughly 116,500 rsETH, worth about $290 million, from a LayerZero-based bridge operated by Kelp DAO.
The incident triggered disruptions across the DeFi ecosystem, with dozens of protocols pausing some functions. On Aave, the attacker used rsETH as collateral to borrow liquidity, contributing to as much as $200 million in bad debt and forcing the protocol to freeze rsETH markets.
According to LayerZero Labs, the exploit was linked to a configuration issue in Kelp’s setup that relied on a single verification path for cross-chain messages.
Separately, Circle said Monday that its venture arm is purchasing AAVE tokens to support the protocol and broader DeFi ecosystem.
Source: Circle on X
Related: Aave asks Arbitrum to send 30K ETH from Kelp exploiter to ‘DeFi United’
DeFi hacks surge in April
The incident comes amid a wave of recent attacks targeting DeFi protocols. According to DefiLlama, about $729 million has been lost to crypto hacks over the last 90 days, with roughly $623 million occurring in April alone.
The month began with a roughly $280 million exploit of Drift Protocol on April 1, carried out through a social engineering attack by an attacker suspected to have ties to North Korea.
DeFi hacks, February-April 2026. Source: DefiLlama
Two weeks later, Rhea Finance said an attacker exploited a vulnerability in its margin trading feature to manipulate liquidity pools, resulting in roughly $7.6 million in losses, according to CertiK. The protocol has since paused operations and is undergoing a phased recovery, with most funds recovered and some USDT still frozen pending release by Tether.
The string of attacks also includes smaller exploits earlier in the month, such as a $410,000 loss at Dango on April 13, a $392,000 oracle-related incident at Silo Finance on April 3 and a $423,000 access control exploit at Aethir on April 9.
While none of the recent attacks have been conclusively linked to artificial intelligence, researchers say advances in the technology are making it easier to identify and exploit vulnerabilities in DeFi systems.
In late 2025, researchers at Anthropic found that AI models could identify more than half of known smart contract exploits, highlighting how the technology could accelerate future attacks.
Data from Polymarket shows traders are pricing in a high likelihood of another major crypto hack this year, with odds at 84% by the end of 2026.
Odds of another crypto hack over $100 million. Source: Polymarket
Magazine: AI-driven hacks could kill DeFi — unless projects act now