Wallets linked to Coinbase and Vitalik Buterin have millions ‘stuck’ in bridge contracts

Dozens of crypto whale wallets with assets ranging from six to seven figures are stuck on multiple decentralized finance (DeFi) bridge contracts.

One of these whale wallets is linked to Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin, who has over $1 million worth of assets stuck for over seven months. While a few other wallets have assets unclaimed for over two years.

According to a report published by crypto analytics firm Arkham Intelligence, several notable whale addresses linked to prominent crypto individuals and entities have their funds stuck in these bridge contracts for as long as two years.

DeFi bridge contracts are software protocols that allow the movement of assets and data between different blockchain networks, enabling interoperability within the DeFi ecosystem.

However, not all DeFi bridges function the same; on the one hand, there are cross-chain bridges that enable users to automatically obtain their assets on the other chain.

On the other hand, traders using native bridges must retrieve their funds manually as there is no way for the smart contract to remind users to do so, which could result in situations where users forget their money.

Among the most notable names, a wallet linked to thomasg.eth has had $800,000 stuck in Arbitrum Bridge for one year and 10 months. Another wallet, linked to Bofur Capital, with 27 wrapped Bitcoin worth $1.8 million, has been stuck for two years and three months.

Similarly, another wallet linked to nonfungible token (NFT) user Mike Macdonald has about $117,000 in assets linked to CryptoPunks sales on a bridge contract.

Arkham suggested the account owner take a look, reminding them that if they “own the account that sent 5 CryptoPunks to, then you might also own the account that received the proceeds after they were sold.”

Another wallet that received 50 Ether (ETH) from Vitalik.eth seems to have been forgotten for seven months and holds nearly $1 million worth of ETH on the Optimism bridge.

One more wallet linked to Coinbase crypto exchange was also identified, containing $75,000 worth of assets that had been stuck for nearly six months.

Arkham suspected Coinbase tried bridging $75,000 worth of USDC to ETH and forgot about it. The assets are stuck in the Optimism bridge contract and waiting to be claimed.

Arkahm Research notified whales linked to these stuck and forgotten funds to retrieve them in case they have forgotten about them. They also reminded the community that these instances occur due to the nature of these native bridges.