Incident Overview
On June 30, 2026, the Pepe Trump ($PEPETrump) project on the BNB Chain executed a malicious rug pull, draining approximately $38,500 from its primary PancakeSwap liquidity pool.
The rug pull was orchestrated via a pre-programmed backdoor embedded in the token's non-standard architecture. The PEPEToken contract overrode the standard ERC-20 balanceOf() function, delegating all balance queries to an external, upgradeable contract named LockupContractFactory.
Immediately before the drain, the deployers upgraded the LockupContractFactory logic to introduce a malicious function selector (0x801425e6). This allowed the attacker to inject arbitrary state variables and manipulate the balance records returned for the PancakePair address. By spoofing the pool's internal token tracking, the deployers cleanly skewed the AMM pricing logic and siphoned out the paired liquidity into the hacker's wallet.
Vulnerable Token Contract: 0xc8168896…7Cd17f
Incident Report
Protocol Information
What the Attacker Needed to Succeed
Understanding the prerequisites for this type of attack helps auditors identify protocols that are most at risk and helps developers build better defenses.
What Auditors Should Check
If you're auditing a protocol with similar architecture to Pepe Trump, these are the critical security checks that could have prevented this incident (June 2026).
- Verify all logic paths related to Rugpull are guarded by proper access controls and input validation
- Review privileged functions (owner, admin, governance) for potential abuse vectors - centralization risks should be documented and bounded with timelocks or multi-sigs
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