ALEX Lab to Compensate Losses Following $8.3 Million Hack

The DeFi protocol ALEX Lab, built on the Bitcoin Layer 2 solution Stacks, will fully compensate users for losses incurred from a hacking attack amounting to $8.3 million.

On June 6, 2025, ALEX Protocol was exploited via a flaw in the self-listing verification logic (an on-chain limitation on Stacks). As a result, the attacker drained several asset pools, with the breakdown of lost assets as follows:

STX: 8,403,867.57 STX → $ 5,691,255.93
sBTC:…

— ALEX ? No. 1 Bitcoin DeFi (@ALEXLabBTC) June 6, 2025

According to the team’s statement, on June 6, an attacker exploited a vulnerability in the smart contract verification logic. They managed to add a malicious token by referencing a previously failed transaction. This allowed them to bypass checks and withdraw funds from liquidity pools.

Project representatives stated that the main issue lies in the current limitations of the Stacks network, which do not allow for reliable tracking of failed transactions.

To compensate for the losses, the ALEX Lab team will use funds from its own treasury. Affected users will receive individual notifications. To claim compensation, applications must be submitted by June 10.

The recent attack marks the second major breach of the protocol in recent years — in May 2024, the project lost $4.3 million due to the compromise of private keys in a phishing attack.

The compensation process following the first incident is still ongoing. The team managed to persuade centralized exchanges to freeze some of the stolen assets. According to the latest data, eight out of 15 platforms have returned the funds, with negotiations continuing with the rest.

At the time of writing, the native ALEX token is trading at $0.017, having plummeted 17% in 24 hours, according to CoinGecko.

Earlier in May, funds amounting to $11.5 million were withdrawn from the hot wallet of Taiwan’s BitoPro.