Wang Chun, co-founder of F2Pool and founder of stakefish, responded after Oleksii Trofimchuk sued Lido Finance and stakefish in the Superior Court of California, County of Santa Clara, on Sept. 8. The complaint centers on ETH allegedly claimed by competing MEV bots after Trofimchuk’s wallet was compromised. Wang said stakefish, acting as a validator, only included valid transactions under Ethereum’s protocol rules and neither could nor should decide off-chain ownership disputes or competing claims over assets. He warned that forcing validators who follow the protocol to return rewards based on off-chain claims would require them to filter transactions according to ownership assertions they cannot independently verify. In his view, that would place staking rewards under legal uncertainty and damage Ethereum’s decentralization and credible neutrality. Foresight News noted that the dispute traces back to April 2023, when the private key for Trofimchuk’s validator withdrawal address was stolen. About 600 ETH, later valued at roughly $2.2 million, along with staking rewards, was taken. When the stolen funds arrived in October 2024, white-hat MEV arbitrageurs and the hacker competed on-chain, and part of the high transaction fees flowed to stakefish-related service contracts. The complaint alleges that Lido and stakefish improperly benefited by about $1.25 million.
Wang Chun, co-founder of F2Pool and founder of stakefish, said Oleksii Trofimchuk filed suit against Lido Finance and stakefish on Sept. 8 in the Superior Court of California, County of Santa Clara, alleging that after his wallet was compromised, competing MEV bots used high-priority-fee transactions to claim the ETH.
Wang said that as a validator, stakefish only includes valid transactions according to Ethereum protocol rules. It cannot, and should not, decide off-chain ownership or resolve competing claims over assets.
Wang warns of legal uncertainty for staking rewards
He said that if validators who follow the protocol were required to return rewards based on off-chain claims, they would be pushed to filter transactions based on ownership assertions they cannot independently verify. That, he said, would put staking rewards under legal uncertainty and damage Ethereum’s decentralization and credible neutrality.
Dispute traces back to a 2023 private key theft
According to Foresight News, the case stems from an April 2023 theft of the private key for Trofimchuk’s validator withdrawal address. About 600 ETH, later valued at roughly $2.2 million, was stolen along with staking rewards.
When the stolen funds arrived in October 2024, white-hat MEV arbitrageurs and the hacker fought an on-chain race to capture them. Part of the unusually high fees flowed to stakefish-related service contracts. The white-hat side had publicly asked for a refund, but did not receive a response.
Complaint claims roughly $1.25 million in unjust enrichment
In the complaint, Trofimchuk argues that Lido and stakefish benefited by about $1.25 million from the incident, amounting to unjust enrichment.
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