Aave liquidates Kelp DAO attacker's assets, advancing $290 million recovery

Techub News reports, citing CoinPost, that DeFi lending protocol Aave announced on May 7 that it had completed the forced liquidation of the rsETH position held by the attacker of Kelp DAO. The liquidation was executed on the Ethereum and Arbitrum networks, involving an illegal outflow of approximately $292 million that occurred in April 2026. The liquidated assets have been transferred to the Recovery Guardian multi-signature wallet managed by the community coalition "DeFi United" for subsequent compensation. The attacker exploited the LayerZero bridge vulnerability on April 18 to illegally mint 116,500 unbacked rsETH, and used it as collateral on Aave and Compound to borrow Ethereum for fund transfers. DeFi United has pledged over 32,000 Ethereum to repurchase the illegal rsETH and replenish the bridged locked assets. Compound will also carry out similar liquidation measures, expected to recover approximately 16,776 Ethereum.