Garden
Last changed 2026-10-10 · Score recalculated — Rescored under Scoring v2, the published formula (avoid.net/scoring): 14 → 59. Problems weighed by who is responsible: the subject's own conduct −16, incidents the subject suffered −3.2, problems around the subject, caused by others −1.6; legitimacy credit long-running +10, regulated +5. Version history →
Why this score
| Every page starts at | 65 |
| The subject's own conduct | -16 |
| Incidents it suffered (e.g. hacks) | -3.2 |
| Problems around it, caused by others | -1.6 |
| Long-running | +10 |
| Regulated | +5 |
| Sum | 59 |
Score: 59/100 (kept between 0 and 100)
How scoring works →Summary
Garden Finance (garden.finance) is a Bitcoin cross-chain bridge and swap protocol launched in December 2023 by former Ren Protocol core team members, using Hashed Timelock Contracts (HTLCs) and an intents-based solver network to enable non-custodial Bitcoin swaps across chains. In October 2025, a compromised solver operator lost approximately $11.4 million in a security incident attributed by forensic investigators to a North Korea-linked threat actor. Prior to the exploit, blockchain investigator ZachXBT alleged that a substantial portion of Garden's volume — with estimates ranging from 25% to over 75% — originated from illicit sources including funds stolen in the $1.46 billion Bybit hack by Lazarus Group, allegations the team disputed but did not fully refute.
Connected Entities
9 entities · 60 linked investigations- Ethereum→mentioned with→Bitcoin(60%)
- ZachXBT→mentioned with→Ethereum(70%)
- ZachXBT→mentioned with→Bitcoin(65%)
- ZachXBT→mentioned with→Bybit(70%)
- Garden Finance→mentioned with→Arbitrum(70%)
- Garden Finance→mentioned with→Bitcoin(80%)
- Garden Finance→mentioned with→ZachXBT(70%)
- Garden Finance→mentioned with→Bybit(70%)
- Garden Finance→mentioned with→Garden(70%)
- Garden Finance→mentioned with→Ethereum(70%)
- + 20 more
Timeline(10 events)
2017
Republic Protocol (later Ren Protocol), predecessor project to Garden Finance, founded in Australia by Taiyang Zhang, Loong Wang, and Jaz Gulati.
November 2022
FTX, which had acquired Ren Labs, files for bankruptcy. Ren Protocol collapses, prompting Gulati and Nadimpalli to begin work on Garden Finance.
December 2023
Garden Finance publicly launches as a Bitcoin cross-chain bridge using HTLC atomic swaps and an intents-based solver network.
18 January 2024
SEED governance token launches with a total supply of 147 million tokens. Team and investor allocations subject to 24-month cliff from TGE.
21 February 2025
Bybit exchange suffers a $1.46 billion hack attributed to North Korea's Lazarus Group. ZachXBT later alleges $160 million of these stolen funds transited Garden within 48 hours.
21 June 2025
ZachXBT publicly alleges that more than 80% of Garden Finance's recent fee income was generated from facilitating movement of Lazarus Group-linked Bybit stolen funds. Garden co-founder Jaz Gulati disputes the characterization.
July 2025
ZachXBT publishes a broader analysis alleging 25% or more of Garden's total historical volume is linked to stolen assets, with six-figure profits from illicit flows between April and July 2025.
30 October 2025
Security breach: an attacker gains unauthorized access to the private key infrastructure of a major Garden solver operator and drains approximately $11.4 million in WBTC, USDC, USDT, and ETH across multiple chains. Garden temporarily shuts down its app.
31 October 2025
Garden co-founder Jaz Gulati states user funds are safe and the protocol remains unaffected. Garden offers a 10% whitehat bounty (~$1.1M) for fund return and exploit disclosure. ZachXBT alleges the compromised solver was operated by a Garden team member based on on-chain evidence from a deployer address.
29 January 2026
Garden publishes forensic findings from Ernst and Young and zeroShadow, confirming unauthorized server access from IP addresses located in Japan and China on October 30, 2025, with the compromise attributed to a leaked private key on a compromised device. The attacker is linked to North Korea-affiliated threat actor DangerousPassword (also known as CryptoCore / Sapphire Sleet / UNC1069). No funds recovered.
Decision Log
- slot 455369354 · hash 2ZvWZ8svHvWfuwPxXjPJf6PqxjhpWDbKy6LE8mmpmFCC
- slot 420904985 · hash 2VeoMfD44GqU4MMqwqTBWrvcoNyzC2rG2U51YAgBzvPh
This investigation is cryptographically anchored to the Solana blockchain (2 decisions). 11 of 14 cited source URLs have an Internet Archive snapshot.
model: claude-sonnet-4-6
generated: 5/4/2026, 2:54:20 AM
last updated: 10/10/2026, 6:49:19 PM
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