Bybit Hackers Launder Funds Through Thorchain, Shattering Daily Volume Record

Decentralized liquidity protocol Thorchain recorded its highest-ever daily trading volume on Feb. 26, generating $737.89 million in swap volume. However, crypto enthusiasts quickly pointed out that the volume resulted from the Bybit hackers laundering a portion of the $1.4 billion stolen from the exchange.

In a Feb. 27 X post, a crypto user said that the surge in Thorchain’s daily trading volume was due to the Bybit hackers choosing the platform to launder their funds over Chainflip, which locked the hackers out, while Thorchain did not. Chainflip implemented several protocol updates to keep the Bybit hackers out of the platform.

Thorchain’s inaction after the Bybit hack has caused a stir within its community.

In a Feb. 27 X post, the platform’s chief developer, under the pseudonym Pluto, announced his resignation. Pluto resigned just hours after a Thorchain validator with the pseudonym TCB revealed that he was one of three validators who voted to halt trading on the platform.

“If the network chose to go forward with this nonsense when it could easily be done, I will likely be seeing myself out. This is the biggest money heist in history, let’s be grown ups for a minute here. I guarantee you corporations will not route any money through a protocol that lets these kinds of flows go without doing anything,” TCB said.

There is currently nothing to suggest that Thorchain will take any actions to prevent further laundering through its platform. The protocol’s RUNE token is down by nearly 10% in the past day, according to Coingecko data.

ByBit Money Trail

The Bybit Hackers have moved over $626 million of the stolen funds, according to multiple reports.

In a Feb. 27 X post, blockchain data intelligence platform Arkham Intelligence reported that the hackers had laundered over $240 million worth of ETH of the stolen funds through Thorchain, swapping them for native BTC.

Meanwhile, another researcher said in an X post that 209,384 ETH, or approximately $500 million, had been moved from Ethereum to Bitcoin in the past five days.