Moonwell Hack

Reported loss $3.7M
Base
Oracle Issue

What happened

Moonwell's wrsETH market on Base accepted a faulty oracle price that dramatically overstated collateral value. An attacker supplied a tiny amount of wrsETH and borrowed assets far beyond its real value, leaving the lending market with bad debt.

Technical root cause

Moonwell used an erroneous wrsETH/ETH feed value in collateral calculations. The official account establishes exploitation of an oracle malfunction, without establishing that the attacker caused the faulty reading.

How it happened

  1. Moonwell multiplied its wrsETH/ETH and ETH/USD feeds to value collateral.
  2. The wrsETH/ETH feed returned an erroneous exchange rate, making a small deposit appear extremely valuable.
  3. The attacker borrowed cbXRP, EURC, USDC, AERO, wstETH and cbETH across repeated transactions, then swapped the assets to WETH.
  4. Moonwell restricted supply and borrowing, quarantined wrsETH markets, and replaced their oracles before restoring other borrow caps.

Protocol details

Classification Borrowing and Lending / Protocol Logic / Oracle Manipulation
Protocol Type Lending
Implementation language Solidity
Protocol links Website @MoonwellDeFi

Market Context at Time of Hack

Token Price at Hack $0.0133
Market Cap at Hack $59.6M
Reported loss / token market cap 6.21%
Token Categories
Polkadot Polkadot Ecosystem Moonbeam Ecosystem Base Ecosystem

Security review history

Build your security review skills

Work through hands-on labs covering real exploit mechanics, review techniques, and defensive patterns.