Bug puts $162 million up for grabs, says founder of DeFi platform Compound

Published

4 years ago

October 3, 2021

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We thought the carnage was over for popular decentralized finance, or DeFi, staking protocol Compound, but as it turns out, millions more than we thought are at risk. About $162 million is up for grabs after an upgrade gone very wrong, according to Robert Leshner, founder of Compound Labs.

The price of Compound’s native token, called comp, is down about 4.8%.

At first, the Compound chief tweeted Friday that there was a cap to how many comp tokens could be accidentally distributed, noting that “the impact is bounded, at worst, 280,000 comp tokens,” or about $92.6 million.

But on Sunday morning, Leshner revealed that the pool of cash that had already been emptied once had been replenished – exposing another 202,472.5 comp tokens to exploit, or roughly $66.9 million at its current price.

Some, including a core developer at DeFi platform Yearn, are billing this as the biggest-ever fund loss in a smart contract incident, but investors, for their part, don’t seem to care all that much.

“The crypto market shrugged off the largest-ever fund loss as if it was nothing,” said Mudit Gupta, a core developer at decentralized crypto exchange SushiSwap. “The future for DeFi is bright but we’re in uncharted territory, and there’s a lot to be learned still.”

What keeps going wrong

DeFi protocols such as Compound are designed to recreate traditional financial systems such as banks and exchanges using blockchains enriched with self-executing smart contracts.

On Wednesday, Compound rolled out what should have been a pretty standard upgrade. Soon after implementation, however, it was clear that something had gone seriously wrong, once users started to receive millions of dollars in comp tokens.

For example, $30 million worth of comp tokens were claimed in one transaction.

The saving grace of the entire debacle, however, was the fact that the pool of cash that was open to exploit – something called the Comptroller contract – had a finite amount of tokens. The problem is that this leaky pool got a fresh influx of cash, and 0.5 comp tokens are being added roughly every 15 seconds, according to Gupta.

“When the drip() function was called this morning, it sent the backlog (202,472.5, about two months of COMP since the last time the function was called) into the protocol for distribution to users,” Leshner wrote in a tweet Sunday morning.

Leshner noted that this brought the total comp at risk to 490,000 comp tokens, or about $162 million.

There are a few proposals to fix the bug, but Compound’s governance model is such that any changes to the protocol require a multiday voting window, and Gupta said it takes another week for the successful proposal to be executed.

In the meantime, this pool of cash is once again up for grabs for users who know how to exploit the bug.

Compound made clear that no supplied or borrowed funds were at risk, which is some consolation.

“No user funds are or were at risk so it’s not that big of a deal,” said Gupta. “Everyone kinda got diluted but didn’t lose anything directly.”

There are also some white hats in the community.

After the Compound founder begged users to voluntarily return the platform’s crypto tokens, some did. Leshner said that as of Sunday morning, about 117,000 comp tokens, or $38.7 million, had been returned.

But as Mati Greenspan, portfolio manager and Quantum Economics founder, points out, how things play out with this bug is almost entirely beside the point. “The bigger issue is — can it happen again?” he said.

Compound is the world’s fifth-largest DeFi protocol with a total value locked of $10.3 billion, according to DeFi Llama, which provides ranking and metrics for DeFi protocols.

Greenspan said the protocol can easily absorb this loss and a lot of it will likely be returned, “but the larger issue would be if people lose confidence in the system’s ability to function properly.”

Gupta said one immediate problem is that the Comptroller account has given away comp tokens that were reserved for future rewards.

You can think of Comptroller as the heart of Compound, Gupta explained. It facilitates all core features like borrowing, lending, and rewarding.

Comptroller oversees the pool of cash used to pay rewards to users who provide their crypto to borrowers at a set interest rate, which is typically a single-digit APY.

“Future rewards might have to be reduced to make Comptroller solvent,” said Gupta.

Technology

Tripadvisor stock surges 17% as Starboard Value builds sizable stake in online travel company

Published

4 hours ago

July 3, 2025

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Tripadvisor stock surges 17% as Starboard Value builds sizable stake in online travel company

The Tripadvisor logo is displayed on a tablet.

Mateusz Slodkowski | Sopa Images | Lightrocket | Getty Images

Tripadvisor stock jumped 17% Thursday after Starboard Value revealed a more than 9% stake in the online travel company, according to a securities filing.

The position was valued at about $160 million as of Wednesday’s close.

Tripadvisor shares have been flat since the start of the year after plummeting more than 30% in 2024. Last year, the travel review and booking company said it created a special committee to explore potential options.

Apple’s China iPhone sales grows for the first time in two years

Published

6 hours ago

July 3, 2025

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Apple's China iPhone sales grows for the first time in two years

People stand in front of an Apple store in Beijing, China, on April 9, 2025.

Tingshu Wang | Reuters

Apple iPhone sales in China rose in the second quarter of the year for the first time in two years, Counterpoint Research said, as the tech giant looks to turnaround its business in one of its most critical markets.

Sales of iPhones in China jumped 8% year-on-year in the three months to the end of June, according to Counterpoint Research. It’s the first time Apple has recorded growth in China since the second quarter of 2023.

Apple’s performance was boosted by promotions in May as Chinese e-commerce firms discounted Apple’s iPhone 16 models, its latest devices, Counterpoint said. The tech giant also increased trade-in prices for some iPhone.

“Apple’s adjustment of iPhone prices in May was well timed and well received, coming a week ahead of the 618 shopping festival,” Ethan Qi, associate director at Counterpoint said in a press release. The 618 shopping festival happens in China every June and e-commerce retailers offer heavy discounts.

Apple’s return to growth in China will be welcomed by investors who have seen the company’s stock fall around 15% this year as it faces a number of headwinds.

U.S. President Donald Trump has threatened Apple with tariffs and urged CEO Tim Cook to manufacture iPhones in America, a move experts have said would be near-impossible. China has also been a headache for Apple since Huawei, whose smartphone business was crippled by U.S. sanctions, made a comeback in late 2023 with the release of a new phone containing a more advanced chip that many had thought would be difficult for China to produce.

Since then, Huawei has aggressively launched devices in China and has even begun dipping its toe back into international markets. The Chinese tech giant has found success eating away at some of Apple’s market share in China.

Huawei’s sales rose 12% year-on-year in the second-quarter, according to Counterpoint. The firm was the biggest player in China by market share in the second quarter, followed by Vivo and then Apple in third place.

“Huawei is still riding high on core user loyalty as they replace their old phones for new Huawei releases,” Counterpoint Senior Analyst Ivan Lam said.

Technology

Like Google, China’s biggest search player Baidu is beefing up its product with AI to fight rivals

Published

6 hours ago

July 3, 2025

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Like Google, China's biggest search player Baidu is beefing up its product with AI to fight rivals

Pictured here is the Ernie bot mobile interface, with the Baidu search engine home page in the background.

Future Publishing | Future Publishing | Getty Images

Chinese tech giant Baidu has bolstered its core search platform with artificial intelligence in the biggest overhaul of the product in 10 years.

Analysts told CNBC the move was a bid to keep ahead of fast-moving rivals like DeepSeek, rather than traditional search players.

“There has been some small pressure on the search business but the focus on AI and Ernie Bot is a key move ahead,” Dan Ives, global head of tech research at Wedbush Securities, told CNBC by email. Ernie Bot is Baidu’s AI chatbot.

“Baidu is not waiting around to watch the paint dry, full steam ahead on AI,” he added.

Baidu AI overhaul

Baidu is China’s biggest search engine, but — as is also being seen by Google — the search market is being disrupted.

Users are flocking instead to AI services such as ChatGPT or DeepSeek, which shocked the world this year with its advanced model it claimed was created at a fraction of the cost of rivals.

But Kai Wang, Asia equity market strategist at Morningstar, also noted that short video platforms such as Douyin and Kuaishou are also getting into AI search and piling pressure on Baidu.

To counter this, Baidu made some major changes to its core search product:

Users can now enter more than a thousand characters in the search box, versus 28 previously;
Questions can be asked in a more direct and conversational manner, mirroring how people now use chatbots;
Users can ask questions through voice but also prompt the seach engine with pictures and files;
Baidu has integrated its AI chatbot features, which enable users to generate photos, text and videos, into the product.

“This is more aligned with how people use ChatGPT and DeepSeek in terms of how they look for answers,” Wang said.

Outside of China, Google has also been looking to enhance its core search product with AI, highlighting how search has been under pressure from the burgeoning technology.

Baidu on the offense

Baidu was one of China’s first movers when it came to AI, releasing its first models and ChatGPT-style product Ernie Bot to the public in 2023. Since then, it has aggressively launched updated AI models.

However, the Beijing-headquartered company has also faced intense competition from fellow tech giants like Alibaba and Tencent, as well as upstarts such as DeepSeek.

These companies have also been launching new models and infusing AI into their products and Baidu’s stock has fallen behind as a result. Baidu shares have risen around 2.5% this year, versus a 30.5% surge for Alibaba and a 20% rise for Tencent.

“This is a defensive and offensive move … Baidu needs to be aggressive and perception-wise show they are not the little brother to Tencent on the AI front,” Wedbush Securities’ Ives added.