The bounty offer to recover stolen funds from Sui-based decentralized exchange (DEX) Cetus closely resembles a successful strategy used by a Solana project three years ago.
It turns out that Cetus shares the same development team as Crema Finance, a Solana-based DeFi project that suffered a $9-million hack in 2022 but recovered most of the funds by negotiating with its hacker. Now, Cetus is relying on the same strategy.
Cetus is asking the hacker to return all but $6 million, or 2,324 Ether (ETH), of the stolen funds in exchange for a promise not to pursue legal action. The protocol lost $223 million to an exploit on May 22.
The size of the bounty has sparked backlash from users, with many calling for a formal compensation plan instead. Several community members argue that even if funds are recovered, most of the damage has already