April DeFi hacks triggered $13B outflows, Binance Research

Binance Research reported that a series of decentralized finance exploits in April removed about $13 billion from lending markets and decentralized exchanges, driving total value locked sharply lower and pushing onchain leverage to roughly 38%, a level last seen in 2021.

The bulk of the outflows followed a cluster of attacks that month. One of the largest breaches targeted liquid-staking protocol KelpDAO and involved corruption of data used to verify cross-chain transactions. The incident resulted in a loss of about $300 million and led the protocol to move its rsETH token to Chainlink’s cross-chain protocol, CCIP.

Lending protocol Aave recorded a 44% monthly drop in value locked after depositors withdrew billions within about 48 hours. Multiple lending platforms and decentralized exchanges experienced sharp withdrawals and temporarily paused some services while teams worked to secure systems and stop outflows.

Industry trackers recorded more than 20 separate exploits in April. Investigators identified a common attack vector in some incidents: remote procedure call (RPC) poisoning that allowed attackers to corrupt the data feeding a bridge’s verification network, enabling unauthorized cross-chain transfers.

In response, several protocols migrated cross-chain messaging to alternative providers such as Chainlink CCIP and strengthened verification and monitoring processes. Teams also paused specific services, audited contracts and hardened infrastructure to reduce the risk of similar breaches.

Binance Research attributed the drop in onchain leverage to widespread deleveraging across the sector. Protocol teams and market analysts are monitoring deposit flows and security reforms to track whether liquidity returns to affected markets.