Polyhedra Blames Liquidity Attacks for Sudden 80% Price Drop in ZKJ, Promises Buyback

Co‑founder Tiancheng Xie revealed that Polyhedra Network is launching a buyback strategy to enactment ZKJ token prices aft an “egregious” liquidity onslaught wiped retired implicit 80% of its value.

Jun 17, 2025, 11:50 a.m.

Polyhedra, a crypto protocol whose institution reached unicorn status past year, is promising a buyback program and further steps to rebuild spot successful the crypto community, days aft its token fell much than 80% wrong minutes.

“Now we request to fig retired the existent concern and we request to forestall aboriginal fiscal attack,” laminitis Tiancheng Xie wrote successful an X station earlier Tuesday.”

“We volition bargain backmost more,” Xie added.

On June 15, ZKJ plunged from astir $2 to conscionable 32 cents successful nether an hour, losing astir $500 cardinal successful marketplace cap.

An archetypal post‑mortem released successful Asian greeting hours laid retired assorted factors resulting successful the collapse, including a expected coordinated liquidity onslaught connected PancakeSwap’s ZKJ/KOGE pool, important ZKJ deposits by market-making institution Wintermute into centralized exchanges, and a cascade of liquidations connected CEXs similar Bybit.

On-chain information reveals that respective addresses had drained millions from the ZKJ/KOGE pool. One removed astir $4.3 cardinal successful liquidity supplier (LP) tokens and dumped 1.57 cardinal ZKJ; others followed, unloading adjacent to 1 cardinal ZKJ each.

When the shallow KOGE/USDT excavation couldn’t sorb the merchantability pressure, enactment spilled implicit into the deeper ZKJ/USDT pool, triggering a liquidity spiral, the squad claimed.

Further unit came from a Wintermute-associated code that deposited implicit 3.39 cardinal ZKJ into centralized exchanges successful the clang window, the squad said. However, successful an X post, Wintermute co-founder Evgeny Gaevoy said the team was selling spot and going agelong via ZKJ-tracked futures.

As spot prices collapsed, astir $94 cardinal successful leveraged agelong positions were liquidated betwixt 12:00 and 14:00 UTC, including aggregate six-figure borderline calls that compounded the crash.

To stem the hemorrhage, Polyhedra’s squad injected astir $30 cardinal successful USDT, USDC, and BNB arsenic DEX liquidity. It added that nary ZKJ holdings belonging to the squad were sold.

Polyhedra affirms it’s conducting a afloat method investigation, and its upcoming buyback inaugural aims to some offset the attack’s interaction and deter akin aboriginal exploits.

Token prices roseate by much than 50% pursuing the merchandise of the clang report, but each gains were reversed passim the day, and prices are present up conscionable 1.3% implicit the past 24 hours.