Aave sees $26M wstETH liquidations after oracle glitch

Aave has suffered an oracle glitch, triggering $26 million in unfair wstETH liquidations. The malfunction stemmed from a configuration issue in the protocol’s risk oracle for wrapped staked ETH (wstETH), temporarily underpricing the asset and forcing otherwise healthy positions to be liquidated. No bad debt accrued, and remediation steps are in progress.

Risk oversight partners have identified the specific misconfiguration and outlined a reimbursement path for wallets caught in the event. Stakeholders have also emphasized that the incident did not originate from Lido’s wstETH token or its infrastructure.

Cause: CAPO misconfiguration underpriced wstETH, triggering unfair liquidations

As reported by The Block, the immediate trigger was a CAPO misconfiguration: a mismatch between the snapshot ratio and snapshot timestamp, combined with an on-chain rule that allowed the ratio to increase by only 3% every three days. This constraint produced an approximate 2.85% underpricing of wstETH, making healthy borrow positions appear under-collateralized and eligible for liquidation. The same report indicates roughly $26–27 million in liquidations across 34 accounts, touching about 10,938 wstETH, with liquidators realizing around 499 ETH, and notes there was no bad debt.

A contributor from Lido clarified that the issue was not caused by wstETH or Lido’s infrastructure; rather, it arose from Aave’s oracle configuration. This distinction underscores that the base asset performed as designed, while the pricing mechanism applying caps and update rules was at fault.

Impact: ~$26M liquidated; 34 accounts; no bad debt

The figures indicate concentrated harm to a limited set of borrowers rather than a systemic solvency problem. The report’s conclusion that no bad debt accrued suggests Aave’s core risk controls remained intact even as the mispricing window triggered forced deleveraging.

According to Aave leadership, there was no impact to the Aave Protocol, indicating that reserves and core operations continued to function as intended. Practically, the harm manifested as forced collateral sales and gains to liquidators during the underpricing interval, not as a protocol shortfall.

Compensation: Chaos Labs will fully reimburse affected users

Responsibility for the configuration oversight has been accepted by the protocol’s external risk provider, which said affected users will be made whole. “Every affected user will be fully reimbursed,” said Omer Goldberg, CEO of Chaos Labs.

Implementation specifics, including how impacted addresses can verify eligibility and receive funds, are expected to be published via official channels. Based on current disclosures, reimbursement is intended to cover losses traceable to the underpricing period while broader hardening of oracle parameters is pursued.