Morning Minute: North Korea Hacks Drift for $285M

Morning Minute is a daily newsletter written by*Tyler Warner. The analysis and opinions expressed are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of Decrypt.* *And check out our new daily news show covering all of the top stories in 5 minutes or less, downloadable on Apple Pod or Spotify.*

GM!

Today’s top news:

• Crypto majors jump on speculation of ceasefire; BTC +4% at $69,500
• Drift requests talks with NK hackers after $280M exploit
• Schwab is bringing crypto spot trading to its $12T platform
• Coinbase received conditional approval for national trust bank charter
• Circle is launching cirBTC to compete with WBTC

💀 North Korea Drained $285M From Drift Protocol in 12 Minutes

Drift Protocol, Solana’s largest decentralized perp exchange, was exploited for $285 million on April 1.

As more information came out about the exploit, it seems to have been a governance attack, months in the making, that culminated in 12 minutes of automated draining across 31 rapid withdrawals.

The setup started in October 2025 when attackers posing as a quantitative trading firm approached Drift contributors at “a major crypto conference.” Over six months they built real relationships with protocol insiders in person, at multiple industry events. When the time came, they used that access to socially engineer multisig signers into pre-approving hidden transactions - through a Solana feature called durable nonces that allowed the authorizations to sit dormant for weeks. They also manufactured a fake token (CarbonVote/CVT) with a few thousand dollars in seeded liquidity and wash trading, then used it to manipulate Drift’s price oracles into treating it as legitimate collateral worth hundreds of millions.

Elliptic and TRM Labs both flagged DPRK involvement, making this allegedly the 18th North Korean crypto attack of 2026, with over $300M stolen so far this year alone.

Key Details:

• Drift was exploited for $285M on April 1 in the largest DeFi hack of 2026 and the second-largest in Solana history behind the $326M Wormhole hack in 2022
• The attack: bad actors manufactured a fake token (CVT), manipulated oracles to treat it as real collateral, and used pre-signed durable nonce transactions to drain vaults across 31 withdrawals in 12 minutes
• Six-month operation: attackers posed as a quant firm at crypto events starting October 2025, cultivating trust with Drift contributors in person before accessing admin keys via social engineering
• DRIFT token fell over 40%; TVL collapsed from ~$550M to under $250M; a dozen Solana protocols with Drift dependencies paused operations
• Circle controversy: $232M in USDC bridged to Ethereum via Circle’s CCTP; ZachXBT said Circle could have moved faster to freeze funds; Circle says it only freezes assets when legally required

🏦 Schwab Is Coming for Coinbase

Charles Schwab confirmed to Decrypt this week that spot BTC and ETH trading is launching this quarter.

The firm manages $12.2 trillion in client assets. The brokerage that millions of Americans already use for their retirement accounts and stock portfolios is about to let them buy Bitcoin in the same interface, no separate wallet, no separate exchange account, no new app.

This is different from an ETF. Schwab clients will own spot Bitcoin directly, held via Charles Schwab Premier Bank. The rollout is phased: employees first, then invited clients, then full public.

Every American with a Schwab account is about to have direct BTC and ETH access alongside their S&P 500 index funds by the end of June.

Key Details:

• Charles Schwab confirmed spot BTC and ETH trading launching Q2 2026; $12.2 trillion in AUM
• Schwab Crypto account page is live on the firm’s website; waitlist open for early access
• Structure: direct spot ownership via Charles Schwab Premier Bank SSB - not ETFs, not futures; BTC and ETH only at launch

⚛️ Google Just Moved the Q-Day Timeline

Google published a paper this week demonstrating that quantum computers could crack elliptic curve cryptography (the cryptographic foundation of Bitcoin and Ethereum) using roughly 20 times fewer qubits than previously believed.

The hardware required still doesn’t exist, but the floor for what’s required just dropped significantly.

Google consulted the US government before publishing and used zero-knowledge proofs so outsiders could verify resource estimates without seeing the underlying attack circuits - a sign of just how serious this matter is.

Ethereum Foundation researcher Justin Drake, who joined the paper as a late co-author, put a number on it: at least 10% chance that by 2032 a quantum computer recovers a Bitcoin private key from an exposed public key.

Key Details:

• Google’s paper boosted estimated Q-Day odds by showing elliptic curve cryptography could be cracked with ~20x fewer qubits than previously believed — under 500,000 physical qubits
• Bitcoin vs. Ethereum exposure: Bitcoin’s attack window is ~10 minutes per transaction; Ethereum’s account model permanently exposes public keys once a transaction is sent, giving attackers unlimited time
• Google estimates the 1,000 wealthiest exposed Ethereum accounts (~20.5M ETH) could be cracked in under nine days on a sufficiently advanced quantum machine
• Practical advice now: stop reusing Bitcoin addresses; migrate to Native SegWit (bc1q) or Taproot (bc1p); keep private keys offline in cold storage

🏛️ Coinbase Just Got a Federal Banking Charter

Coinbase received conditional approval from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency for a national trust bank charter this week.

This does not mean that Coinbase is becoming a bank, but it does get federal regulatory uniformity for custodying assets across all 50 states, replacing a state-by-state patchwork that has created friction for institutional clients and new product launches.

The OCC charter means Coinbase operates under a single federal regulator rather than navigating 50 different state licensing regimes for custody. The banks are fighting this, with the ICBA and BPI both filing opposition letters including the BPI arguing the approval would “exceed the OCC’s authority under federal law.” The crypto-to-bank pipeline is getting real, and traditional banking is not happy about it.

Key Details:

• Coinbase received conditional approval from the OCC for a national trust bank charter - not a commercial bank, no deposits, no fractional reserve banking
• Coinbase already had a NYDFS limited purpose trust charter since 2018 - this is the federal upgrade that removes the state-by-state patchwork
• The field: Circle, Ripple, Paxos, Bridge (Stripe), and Crypto.com all received conditional OCC approval before Coinbase; Anchorage Digital was first with a full charter in 2021
• Payments flagged explicitly in Coinbase’s blog post as the core expansion area the charter enables

₿ Circle Is Coming for the Wrapped Bitcoin Market

Circle, the company behind USDC, is launching cirBTC as a wrapped Bitcoin token backed 1:1 by native on-chain Bitcoin reserves. It launches first on Ethereum mainnet and Arc, Circle’s own stablecoin-focused blockchain.

The pitch from Circle VP of product Rachel Mayer: “Bitcoin is sitting on the sidelines of DeFi. Not because people don’t want yield or liquidity - it’s because they don’t trust the wrapper.”

The wrapper trust problem is real. WBTC, the dominant wrapped Bitcoin with ~$8 billion in market cap, has faced scrutiny over its custody arrangements. Coinbase launched cbBTC last year and then delisted WBTC from its exchange. cbBTC now has ~$6 billion in market cap. Circle is entering this market with its institutional credibility argument: the same infrastructure that backs USDC, now applied to Bitcoin. It’s a strong pitch…

Key Details:

• • Circle announced cirBTC, a wrapped Bitcoin token backed 1:1 by native on-chain Bitcoin reserves; launching first on Ethereum mainnet and Arc
  • Competition: BitGo’s WBTC ($8B market cap) and Coinbase’s cbBTC ($6B market cap) are the current dominant products
  • cirBTC integrates natively with USDC and Circle Mint; ETH mainnet and Arc at launch; broader chain support expected
  • CRCL stock is down ~40% over six months to ~$90; cirBTC is part of Circle’s push to expand beyond stablecoins into broader crypto infrastructure

🌎 Macro Crypto and Markets

• Crypto majors rallied overnight as speculation of ceasefire rises; BTC +4% at $69.5k; ETH +5% at $2,150; SOL +3% at $82; HYPE +4% at $37.20
• FIL (+8%), ARB (+8%), and TAO (+8%) led top movers
• Oil -2% at $110; Gold +1% at $4,700
• Bitcoin closed Q1 2026 as its worst quarter since early 2018, shedding 22% as war, tariffs, and a hawkish Fed drove prices lower
• FIFA named ADI Predictstreet as its first official prediction market partner for the 2026 World Cup, skipping Polymarket and Kalshi in favor of an unproven newcomer built on an Ethereum L2
• New Attorney General Todd Blanche held Bitcoin but continued prosecuting crypto software developers under his tenure as deputy AG; Trump fired Pam Bondi and elevated Blanche to run the DOJ last week

Corporate Treasuries & ETFs

• The Bitcoin ETFs saw $22M in net inflows over last week, while the ETH ETFs had $42M in net outflows
• Riot Platforms sold $250M in Bitcoin during Q1 (3,778 BTC at an average price of $76,000), its second straight quarter of sales as it pivots toward AI infrastructure; holdings now 15,680 BTC
• Saylor’s STRC was at $100 or above across 3 days last week for the first time since the early March run

Meme Coin Tracker

• Meme leaders were very green outpacing majors; DOGE +3%, SHIB +4%, PEPE +6%, TRUMP +3%, PENGU +8%, SPX +12%, FARTCOIN +8%
• No notable top movers onchain

💰 Token, Airdrop & Protocol Tracker

• The Ethereum Foundation staked 45,034 ETH worth ~$93M Friday, bringing its total staked position to ~69,500 ETH, nearly completing the 70,000 ETH target it announced in February
• Dmail Network is shutting down May 15 after five years, citing unsustainable decentralized infrastructure costs, failed monetization, financing failures, and core team departures (DMAIL token -70%)

🚚 What is happening in NFTs?

• NFT leaders were mostly green after OpenSea farming ended; Punks even at 28.8 ETH, Pudgy +3% at 4.3 ETH, BAYC +7% at 6.3 ETH; Hypurr’s even at 400 HYPE
• Catzo(+40%) and MAYC (+9%) led notable movers