Standard Chartered Sticks to $2T RWA Forecast Despite $292M DeFi Hack

Standard Chartered has maintained its $2 trillion real-world assets (RWA) tokenized market cap forecast by end-2028, despite a recent DeFi hack that caused over $292 million in losses. The bank's research note, titled 'DeFi - Bent, not broken,' attributed the damage to an asset-liability mismatch within DeFi lending markets.

The KelpDAO exploit on April 18, 2026, involved the theft of roughly $292 million in rsETH through a forged LayerZero message. The attacker then deposited these stolen tokens as collateral into Aave, the sector's largest DeFi lending protocol, causing a panic that triggered bank-run-style withdrawals.

Aave lost $17 billion in deposits and $5.5 billion in active loans due to the attack, representing 38% and 31% declines respectively. The coalition led by Aave and its founder Stani Kulechov committed over $300 million to stabilize the protocol.