Summary
- BONK experienced a $20 million theft linked to a malicious governance attack.
- A proposal led to the transfer of 4.4 trillion BONK tokens to an address associated with the alleged attacker.
- The Bonk team is collaborating with exchanges and the Solana Foundation to address the issue.
BonkDAO, the decentralized autonomous organization connected to the well-known Bonk meme coin on Solana, has fallen prey to a "malicious" governance attack, leading to the theft of approximately $20 million from its treasury.
The team managing the meme coin is actively engaged with centralized exchanges, network bridges, and the Solana Foundation to navigate this crisis.
“During the inquiry, BonkDAO pinpointed the exchange wallets that were utilized to acquire BONK prior to the proposal,” the meme coin account announced on X.
“We have notified law enforcement,” it added. “BonkDAO is continuing to collaborate with the relevant parties to recover the stolen assets and identify those accountable.”
BonkDAO was subjected to a malicious governance proposal that led to an estimated $20 million worth of BONK tokens being siphoned from the BonkDAO treasury.
During the investigation, BonkDAO identified the exchange wallets used to purchase BONK ahead of the proposal. BonkDAO is…
— BONK!!! (@bonk_inu) July 6, 2026
over 4.4 trillion BONK tokens, valued at $19.3 million at the time, were transferred from the treasury wallet to an address ending in “JHvQ.”
This event was marked as the second critical instruction in Bonk Improvement Proposal #76, a governance proposal that was submitted and approved through BonkDAO’s governance platform.
Titled “Sowellian BonkDAO,” the proposal aimed to “implement Sowellian governance, appoint new members and council, rebuild from the ashes, monetize holdings, and stop the bleeding.”
It also specified that all “yes” voters would be eligible to receive BONK tokens. However, the tokens that were sent to “JHvQ”—a wallet identified by Solana blockchain explorer Solscan as being funded through a Bybit account—have not been distributed to any other parties. Instead, they were transferred around 3:30 p.m. ET to another Solana address ending in “eh42.”
Following the incident, cryptocurrency exchanges took measures. Upbit, a South Korean exchange, and Kraken, an American exchange, have both suspended deposits and withdrawals of the BONK token, with the former citing “user protection measures in light of the security incident.”
Once among the top 100 cryptocurrencies by market cap, BONK has declined about 7% in the past 24 hours, trading at approximately $0.0000043. This price is roughly 93% lower than its peak of $0.000058.