DeFi Is Having Its Worst Month Yet

gm, Defiers!

TL;DR:

Wasabi suffers $5M+ exploit
Circle rolls out fee-free Nanopayments
PayPal reorg includes crypto division
Energy Web Is Building the Verification Layer for Real-World Markets [MEDIA PARTNERSHIP]

Let’s dive in.

April proved to be crypto’s worst month ever for hacks and exploits. Not in terms of dollars stolen (if we count CeFi hacks like Bybit’s), but in terms of the sheer number of incidents.

In the past month (which still has some hours left as I type this), nearly 30 crypto platforms suffered hacks/exploits, with losses totaling $629.8 million, per DefiLlama. Some for “just” tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars, some for hundreds of millions.

For decentralized protocols, it may be the worst month on record by value stolen (in USD) too.

Just today, security firm PeckShield reported that Wasabi Protocol had become the latest victim. The protocol’s admin key had been compromised, leading to it losing over $5M across multiple chains. Just the day before, Syndicate was hacked for ~$330K, also via a comprised private key. The same day, nearly $3.5M was drained from SWEAT.

DeFi analyst and Pink Brains co-founder Ignas observed that the recent hacks follow a particular pattern, targeting older, more niche protocols, often for relatively small amounts. Ignas points to the rise of AI tools in lowering the barriers (time, cost) to exploiting vulnerable protocols. “This will likely last until old, unmaintained projects are milked out of their last cents or the industry improves security,” they wrote on X.

The record exploit month highlights were of course Drift and Kelp, which nearly bookended the month and together accounted for ~$578 million, or 91.8% of April's total losses. They represent two of the largest exploits in DeFi ever, in dollar terms.

And what about users? Per DefiLlama, as of today, so far, zero funds have been returned across all 28 incidents from April.

The DeFi United effort is certainly making headlines as a new precedent, bringing together some of the most prominent protocols and individuals in a collective fundraising effort to fix the damage from the Kelp exploit. But with even DeFi’s largest player affected this month (if in an indirect way), it’s also stirring up debate about what DeFi needs to do better, and how the industry should move forward from here.

Stay safe,

Olivia, senior editor at The Defiant

Nexo is a digital wealth platform offering crypto yield up to 15% and crypto-backed credit lines from 1.9%. Join and get 30-day access to exclusive rates. Terms apply.

The next version of your app works wherever your users do.

Your roadmap has 'expand to Solana' or 'add Sui support' sitting somewhere below the line. Going live on those networks wins users. Building the integration eats your roadmap. Every new network needs its own integration, its own bridge logic, its own audit.

SODAX gives you trading, lending, and borrowing across 18+ networks through one SDK, for developers and AI agents. Launch with the most-traded assets in DeFi. EVM, Solana, Sui, Stellar, and more. You ship the feature. We handle the networks.

Find us at Consensus 2026 in Miami this week or pop in at our Miami Heat: Cocktails & Connections side event on May 5.

Ship now

TICKER	VALUE	24H
BTC	$76,424	▲ 1.20%
ETH	$2,263	▲ 1.27%
XRP	$1.37	▲ 1.18%
BNB	$617.92	▲ 0.65%
SOL	$83.15	▲ 1.13%

Forwarded this newsletter? Subscribe for daily insights and curated news from The Defiant team, Monday-Saturday. It’s free.

The $300M DeFi Bailout: Heroic or Unsustainable?

Was DeFi United a bailout or just voluntary market coordination? The Defiant's Camila Russo is joined by Dean Eigenmann (Markets Inc.), binji (Ethereum Foundation), and David Phelps (Confetti) to debate whether crypto bailouts are good for crypto, what this means for decentralization, and what DeFi must fix before it can scale to the mainstream.

Watch the full debate here: