In a step towards restoring confidence and operations in the Sui ecosystem, validators representing nearly 91% of total Sui stake have overwhelmingly approved an on-chain proposal to release approximately $162 million in funds frozen during last week’s Cetus exploit. This decision allows Cetus, a leading decentralized exchange (DEX) on Sui, to begin the process of reimbursing users and restoring full functionality to its platform.
The 48-hour referendum, which concluded on May 29, saw more than two-thirds of the network’s validators endorse the measure, signaling a strong community commitment to addressing the aftermath of the attack.
The approved transaction provides the crucial mechanism for recovery, instructing validators to transfer the frozen tokens to a secure multi-signature wallet. This wallet will be jointly controlled by Cetus, the blockchain security auditing firm OtterSec, and the Sui Foundation, ensuring a multi-party oversight for the funds.
The Sui Foundation has officially confirmed the successful outcome of the vote, stating that the funds will remain in trust until Cetus fully executes its repayment plan. In a message to stakers and node operators, the foundation underscored the importance of community involvement, noting, “Protocol governance is only possible through your active participation,” and commending them for the swift conclusion of the vote.
This decisive action effectively resolves a key uncertainty that has lingered since the May 22 attack, which initially drained an estimated $223 million in liquidity from the Cetus protocol. While attackers managed to bridge roughly $61 million to the Ethereum blockchain before validators successfully halted the associated addresses, a substantial $162 million remained stranded on the Sui network.
Cetus had previously informed its users on May 27 that it possessed the necessary reserves and had secured a short-term loan from the Sui Foundation to cover the funds bridged to Ethereum. However, the critical step of unlocking the frozen balance on Sui required the explicit consent of the community.
With the funds now accessible, Cetus has laid out an ambitious eight-step recovery schedule, aiming for a complete relaunch of its platform within one week. The initial phase will involve validators executing the necessary protocol upgrade to facilitate the transfer of the locked assets into the tri-party controlled wallet.
The subsequent steps in Cetus’s recovery plan include restoring comprehensive pool data, meticulously calculating individual liquidity deficits for affected users, and then converting the retrieved tokens back to their original composition.
