Cetus Hack Exposes Potential Centralization Risks in Sui Ecosystem

The Cetus Protocol exploit has emerged as the third-largest decentralized finance hack in 2025, trailing only the $340 million Wormhole bridge attack in March and the $285 million Euler Finance incident in February. Attackers targeted multiple liquidity pools simultaneously, exploiting a previously unknown vulnerability in the protocol’s automated market Maker contracts, which oversee more than $800 million in total value locked.

Forensic analysis indicates the breach involved a sophisticated flash loan manipulation paired with a reentrancy exploit, bypassing standard security checks. The incident has laid bare critical vulnerabilities in smart contract security and network governance structures, potentially reshaping investor confidence in next-generation blockchain platforms.