{"investigation":{"slug":"gains-network","entity_name":"Gains Network","trust_score":68,"severity_base":null,"score_modifier":0,"confidence":0.45,"status":"published","content_type":"investigation","summary":"Gains Network is a decentralized leveraged-trading protocol whose product, gTrade, lets users trade crypto, forex, commodities, stocks and indices with up to 1000x leverage, with trader profit and loss settled against protocol vaults. DefiLlama lists it on Base, Arbitrum, Polygon, ApeChain and MegaETH. This review found no reported exploit of the core protocol, but its design carries inherent leverage and counterparty-vault risk. The requester's aggregate TVL (about $6.5M) and GNS market cap (about $9.7M) figures could not be re-verified from a primary source in this run.","sections":[{"content":"Gains' documentation describes gTrade as a service for trading crypto, forex, commodities, stocks and indices with up to 1000x leverage, where Gains routes orders, prices markets and settles trader PnL. The documentation links a trading interface, a Solana interface, GNS staking, vaults, OTC, referrals and a bridge. DefiLlama's protocol data lists Base, Arbitrum, Polygon, ApeChain and MegaETH as chains, shows a listing date of December 2021, and shows Base TVL of roughly $967K in October 2026. The aggregate TVL and GNS market cap figures supplied by the requester (about $6.5M and $9.7M) could not be confirmed in this run, because the DefiLlama page was blocked and the API response was truncated.","heading":"Overview and design","sources":[{"url":"https://docs.gains.trade/","name":"Gains Network documentation","type":"official","credibility":2},{"url":"https://api.llama.fi/protocol/gains-network","name":"DefiLlama API: gains-network","type":"on_chain","credibility":2}],"severity":"low"},{"content":"Secondary explainers describe gTrade as settling trader PnL against a vault, so trader profits reduce vault funds and trader losses increase them. One analysis argues this model depends on traders losing over the long run and calls that a systemic risk. Descriptions of the vault and GNS rebalancing parameters differ between sources and appear to date from around 2022, so the current mechanism should be checked against Gains' documentation. Very high leverage (up to 1000x per the documentation) carries a high risk of rapid user losses.","heading":"Counterparty-vault and leverage risk","sources":[{"url":"https://blockstar.substack.com/p/blockstar-research-report-gains-network","name":"Blockstar Research Report: Gains Network","type":"research","credibility":3},{"url":"https://hackernoon.com/overview-of-the-gains-network-and-its-gtrade-platform-is-it-the-future-or-is-it-too-risky","name":"HackerNoon overview of Gains Network and gTrade","type":"news_article","credibility":3}],"severity":"medium"},{"content":"In May 2024 Blockonomi reported that security firm Zellic found two bugs affecting Gains-derived code. A stop-loss bug was found only in a fork, not in Gains itself. A take-profit/stop-loss overflow bug affected a previous Gains version and was reported as since patched. Zellic reported the issues on April 19 (2024) and said other forks might still contain them. The forks Gambit Trade, Holdstation Exchange and Krav Trade said they were not affected. Searches for 2025-2026 oracle manipulation, bad-debt or vault-loss incidents at Gains found no reports, but absence of results is not proof that none occurred. Gains lists a bug bounty on Immunefi, and DefiLlama's page references a CertiK audit; full audit reports were not reviewed here.","heading":"Security history","sources":[{"url":"https://blockonomi.com/gains-network-fork-bugs-allow-900-profit-on-every-trade-security-firm-finds/","name":"Blockonomi: Gains Network fork bugs (Zellic)","type":"news_article","credibility":2},{"url":"https://immunefi.com/bug-bounty/gainsnetwork/scope","name":"Immunefi: Gains Network bug bounty scope","type":"official","credibility":2}],"severity":"low"},{"content":"A search summary reported that a trader bought about $208,000 of GNS shortly before its Binance listing and reportedly made about $106,000. This was seen only in an aggregated search summary and not verified against a primary source, so it is excluded from scoring and treated as low confidence.","heading":"Token listing trading activity","sources":[{"url":"https://wikidocs.net/323241","name":"Gains Network (gTrade) protocol overview (WikiDocs)","type":"other","credibility":3}],"severity":"low"},{"content":"This review did not find a regulatory action, court filing or confirmed exploit against Gains Network. Team identity, current audit reports, current vault collateralization and aggregate TVL were not verified from primary sources. Readers should consult the official documentation, on-chain data and audit reports directly.","heading":"Information gaps","sources":[{"url":"https://docs.gains.trade/","name":"Gains Network documentation","type":"official","credibility":2}],"severity":"low"}],"timeline":[{"date":"2021-12","event":"Gains Network listed on DefiLlama (listing timestamp December 2021).","source":"DefiLlama API","source_url":"https://api.llama.fi/protocol/gains-network"},{"date":"2024-05-10","event":"Blockonomi reports Zellic findings of bugs in Gains forks and a previously patched Gains version bug.","source":"Blockonomi","source_url":"https://blockonomi.com/gains-network-fork-bugs-allow-900-profit-on-every-trade-security-firm-finds/","date_evidence":"Publication date: May 10, 2024, by Oliver Dale of Blockonomi"}],"sources_used":[{"url":"https://docs.gains.trade/","name":"Gains Network documentation","type":"official","archive_url":"http://web.archive.org/web/20261008114710/https://docs.gains.trade/","credibility":2,"archive_timestamp":"2026-10-08T11:47:10+00:00"},{"url":"https://api.llama.fi/protocol/gains-network","name":"DefiLlama API: gains-network","type":"on_chain","archive_url":"http://web.archive.org/web/20261013084954/https://api.llama.fi/protocol/gains-network","credibility":2,"archive_timestamp":"2026-10-13T08:49:54+00:00"},{"url":"https://blockonomi.com/gains-network-fork-bugs-allow-900-profit-on-every-trade-security-firm-finds/","name":"Blockonomi: Gains Network fork bugs (Zellic)","type":"news_article","archive_url":"http://web.archive.org/web/20261013175604/https://blockonomi.com/gains-network-fork-bugs-allow-900-profit-on-every-trade-security-firm-finds/","credibility":2,"archive_timestamp":"2026-10-13T17:56:04+00:00"},{"url":"https://immunefi.com/bug-bounty/gainsnetwork/scope","name":"Immunefi: Gains Network bug bounty scope","type":"official","archive_url":"http://web.archive.org/web/20251211010346/https://immunefi.com/bug-bounty/gainsnetwork/scope/","credibility":2,"archive_timestamp":"2025-12-11T01:03:46+00:00"},{"url":"https://blockstar.substack.com/p/blockstar-research-report-gains-network","name":"Blockstar Research Report: Gains Network","type":"research","archive_url":"http://web.archive.org/web/20261013175656/https://blockstar.substack.com/p/blockstar-research-report-gains-network","credibility":3,"archive_timestamp":"2026-10-13T17:56:56+00:00"},{"url":"https://hackernoon.com/overview-of-the-gains-network-and-its-gtrade-platform-is-it-the-future-or-is-it-too-risky","name":"HackerNoon overview of Gains Network and gTrade","type":"news_article","archive_url":"https://web.archive.org/web/20261013180729/https://hackernoon.com/overview-of-the-gains-network-and-its-gtrade-platform-is-it-the-future-or-is-it-too-risky","credibility":3,"archive_timestamp":"2026-10-13T18:07:29+00:00"},{"url":"https://wikidocs.net/323241","name":"Gains Network (gTrade) protocol overview (WikiDocs)","type":"other","archive_url":null,"credibility":3,"archive_error":"error:no-request","archive_status":"unarchivable","archive_timestamp":null}],"source_tags":[],"addresses":[],"reviewed":false,"reviewed_by":null,"model_used":"claude-code-investigator","created_at":"2026-10-13T05:11:53.739858+00:00","updated_at":"2026-10-13T19:04:18.142116+00:00"},"source_quality":{"total":7,"tier1":0,"tier2":0,"tier3":0,"unrated":7},"follower_count":null,"content_updated_at":"2026-10-13T05:11:53.983Z","last_fact_checked_at":null,"fact_check_next_allowed_at":null,"update_next_allowed_at":null}