Astra Nova, an AI-powered entertainment platform, has confirmed significant losses related to its newly launched RVV token.
The project said in a statement on October 18 that the breach was related to the compromise of an account owned by one of its third-party market makers.
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Astra Nova loses over $10 million on RVV tokens
The team said the attackers used a compromised market maker account to launch the attack shortly after the token debuted.
Astra Nova did not disclose the total amount of tokens leaked through this exploit.
However, blockchain analyst EmberCN estimates the loss at approximately $10.3 million.
The analyst said on-chain data shows that the attackers withdrew 860 million RVV tokens from the project’s minting contracts, representing about 8.6% of the total supply. These tokens were later exchanged for Tether’s USDT stablecoin.
This massive decline caused an immediate market reaction. According to CoinGecko, the price of RVV plummeted by more than 50% in less than 24 hours, dropping from $0.26 to approximately $0.0103 at the time of writing.
EmberCN added that approximately $8.2 million of the proceeds were transferred to two centralized exchanges, including Gate and KuCoin. Another $2 million remains in on-chain wallets that are currently being monitored.
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In light of this, EmberCN questioned Astra Nova’s account of the incident, arguing that the transaction pattern did not resemble typical hacker behavior.
“Would any hacker convert their stolen assets to USDT and keep it? Or even transfer it directly to CEX? USDT can be frozen and go straight to CEX. What hacker would be this stupid?” EmberCN wrote.
Token buyback and bounty offer
In the wake of skepticism and the market crash, Astranova reaffirmed that it was the victim of external compromise, not internal fraud.
The project announced plans to buy back the same number of RVV tokens affected by the breach. This move is aimed at stabilizing the liquidity of the token and reassuring investors.
At the same time, the Astro Nova team has launched a 10% bounty program for those who return stolen assets to verified recovery addresses.
The project team said it would not take legal action if the full amount was returned. He also said the proposal was an opportunity to “end it peacefully.”
“If you refund the full amount to the confirmed collection address shared on our official channels, no further action will be taken and your bounty will be transferred as soon as it is verified by our forensic team,” the project said.
