Merge pull request #1629 from HackTricks-wiki/update_The__9M_yETH_Exploit__How_16_Wei_Became_Infinite_T_20251202_183152

The $9M yETH Exploit How 16 Wei Became Infinite Tokens

Author: carlospolop

src/SUMMARY.md

@@ -93,6 +93,7 @@
 
 # 🧙‍♂️ Generic Hacking
 
+  - [Defi Amm Virtual Balance Cache Exploitation](blockchain/blockchain-and-crypto-currencies/defi-amm-virtual-balance-cache-exploitation.md)
 - [Archive Extraction Path Traversal](generic-hacking/archive-extraction-path-traversal.md)
 - [Brute Force - CheatSheet](generic-hacking/brute-force.md)
 - [Esim Javacard Exploitation](generic-hacking/esim-javacard-exploitation.md)

src/blockchain/blockchain-and-crypto-currencies/README.md

@@ -201,6 +201,12 @@ If you are researching practical exploitation of DEXes and AMMs (Uniswap v4 hook
 defi-amm-hook-precision.md
 {{#endref}}
 
+For multi-asset weighted pools that cache virtual balances and can be poisoned when `supply == 0`, study:
+
+{{#ref}}
+defi-amm-virtual-balance-cache-exploitation.md
+{{#endref}}
+
 {{#include ../../banners/hacktricks-training.md}}
 
 

src/blockchain/blockchain-and-crypto-currencies/defi-amm-virtual-balance-cache-exploitation.md

@@ -0,0 +1,90 @@
+# DeFi AMM Accounting Bugs & Virtual Balance Cache Exploitation
+
+{{#include ../../banners/hacktricks-training.md}}
+
+## Overview
+
+Yearn Finance's yETH pool (Nov 2025) exposed how gas-saving caches inside complex AMMs can be weaponized when they are not reconciled during boundary-state transitions. The weighted stableswap pool tracks up to 32 liquid staking derivatives (LSDs), converts them to ETH-equivalent **virtual balances** (`vb_i = balance_i × rate_i / PRECISION`), and stores those values in a packed storage array `packed_vbs[]`. When **all LP tokens are burned**, `totalSupply` correctly drops to zero but the cached `packed_vbs[i]` slots retained huge historic values. The subsequent depositor was treated as the "first" liquidity provider even though the cache still held phantom liquidity, letting an attacker mint ~235 septillion yETH for only **16 wei** before draining ≈USD 9M in LSD collateral.
+
+Key ingredients:
+
+- **Derived-state caching**: expensive oracle lookups are avoided by persisting virtual balances and incrementally updating them.
+- **Missing reset when `supply == 0`**: `remove_liquidity()` proportional decrements left non-zero residues in `packed_vbs[]` after each withdrawal cycle.
+- **Initialization branch trusts the cache**: `add_liquidity()` calls `_calc_vb_prod_sum()` and simply **reads** `packed_vbs[]` when `prev_supply == 0`, assuming the cache is also zeroed.
+- **Flash-loan financed state poisoning**: deposit/withdraw loops amplified rounding residues with no capital lockup, enabling a catastrophic over-mint in the "first deposit" path.
+
+## Cache design & missing boundary handling
+
+The vulnerable flow is simplified below:
+
+```solidity
+function remove_liquidity(uint256 burnAmount) external {
+    uint256 supplyBefore = totalSupply();
+    _burn(msg.sender, burnAmount);
+
+    for (uint256 i; i < tokens.length; ++i) {
+        packed_vbs[i] -= packed_vbs[i] * burnAmount / supplyBefore; // truncates to floor
+    }
+
+    // BUG: packed_vbs not cleared when supply hits zero
+}
+
+function add_liquidity(Amounts calldata amountsIn) external {
+    uint256 prevSupply = totalSupply();
+    uint256 sumVb = prevSupply == 0 ? _calc_vb_prod_sum() : _calc_adjusted_vb(amountsIn);
+    uint256 lpToMint = pricingInvariant(sumVb, prevSupply, amountsIn);
+    _mint(msg.sender, lpToMint);
+}
+
+function _calc_vb_prod_sum() internal view returns (uint256 sum) {
+    for (uint256 i; i < tokens.length; ++i) {
+        sum += packed_vbs[i]; // assumes cache == 0 for a pristine pool
+    }
+}
+```
+
+Because `remove_liquidity()` only applied proportional decrements, every loop left **fixed-point rounding dust**. After ≳10 deposit/withdraw cycles those residues accumulated into extremely large phantom virtual balances while the on-chain token balances were almost empty. Burning the final LP shares set `totalSupply` to zero yet caches stayed populated, priming the protocol for a malformed initialization.
+
+## Exploit playbook (yETH case study)
+
+1. **Flash-loan working capital** – Borrow wstETH, rETH, cbETH, ETHx, WETH, etc. from Balancer/Aave to avoid tying up capital while manipulating the pool.
+2. **Poison `packed_vbs[]`** – Loop deposits and withdrawals across eight LSD assets. Each partial withdrawal truncates `packed_vbs[i] − vb_share`, leaving >0 residues per token. Repeating the loop inflates phantom ETH-equivalent balances without raising suspicion because real balances roughly net out.
+3. **Force `supply == 0`** – Burn every remaining LP token so the pool believes it is empty. Implementation oversight leaves the poisoned `packed_vbs[]` untouched.
+4. **Dust-size "first deposit"** – Send a total of 16 wei divided across the supported LSD slots. `add_liquidity()` sees `prev_supply == 0`, runs `_calc_vb_prod_sum()`, and reads the stale cache instead of recomputing from actual balances. The mint calculation therefore acts as if trillions of USD entered, emitting **~2.35×10^26 yETH**.
+5. **Drain & repay** – Redeem the inflated LP position for all vaulted LSDs, swap yETH→WETH on Balancer, convert to ETH via Uniswap v3, repay flash loans/fees, and launder the profit (e.g., through Tornado Cash). Net profit ≈USD 9M while only 16 wei of own funds ever touched the pool.
+
+## Generalized exploitation conditions
+
+You can abuse similar AMMs when all of the following hold:
+
+- **Cached derivatives of balances** (virtual balances, TWAP snapshots, invariant helpers) persist between transactions for gas savings.
+- **Partial updates truncate** results (floor division, fixed-point rounding), letting an attacker accumulate stateful residues via symmetric deposit/withdraw cycles.
+- **Boundary conditions reuse caches** instead of ground-truth recomputation, especially when `totalSupply == 0`, `totalLiquidity == 0`, or pool composition resets.
+- **Minting logic lacks ratio sanity checks** (e.g., absence of `expected_value/actual_value` bounds) so a dust deposit can mint essentially the entire historic supply.
+- **Cheap capital is available** (flash loans or internal credit) to run dozens of state-adjusting operations inside one transaction or tightly choreographed bundle.
+
+## Defensive engineering checklist
+
+- **Explicit resets when supply/lpShares hit zero**:
+  ```solidity
+  if (totalSupply == 0) {
+      for (uint256 i; i < tokens.length; ++i) packed_vbs[i] = 0;
+  }
+  ```
+  Apply the same treatment to every cached accumulator derived from balances or oracle data.
+- **Recompute on initialization branches** – When `prev_supply == 0`, ignore caches entirely and rebuild virtual balances from actual token balances + live oracle rates.
+- **Minting sanity bounds** – Revert if `lpToMint > depositValue × MAX_INIT_RATIO` or if a single transaction mints >X% of historic supply while total deposits are below a minimal threshold.
+- **Rounding-residue drains** – Aggregate per-token dust into a sink (treasury/burn) so repeated proportional adjustments do not drift caches away from real balances.
+- **Differential tests** – For every state transition (add/remove/swap), recompute the same invariant off-chain with high-precision math and assert equality within a tight epsilon even after full liquidity drains.
+
+## Monitoring & response
+
+- **Multi-transaction detection** – Track sequences of near-symmetric deposit/withdraw events that leave the pool with low balances but high cached state, followed by `supply == 0`. Single-transaction anomaly detectors miss these poisoning campaigns.
+- **Runtime simulations** – Before executing `add_liquidity()`, recompute virtual balances from scratch and compare with cached sums; revert or pause if deltas exceed a basis-point threshold.
+- **Flash-loan aware alerts** – Flag transactions that combine large flash loans, exhaustive pool withdrawals, and a dust-sized final deposit; block or require manual approval.
+
+## References
+
+- [Check Point Research – The $9M yETH Exploit: How 16 Wei Became Infinite Tokens](https://research.checkpoint.com/2025/16-wei/)
+
+{{#include ../../banners/hacktricks-training.md}}