According to Arkham Intelligence’s report on September 5, an MEV bot borrowed nearly $12 million in Wrapped Ether for a sandwich attack but only made $20 in profit.
An MEV (Maximum Extractable Value) bot recently obtained a $12 million flash loan, but it only generated a meager $20 profit from a sandwich attack, which is scarcely sufficient to purchase a sandwich.
The bot borrowed nearly $11.97 million in Wrapped Ether (WETH) to sandwich a user who was attempting to exchange approximately $5,000 worth of Shuffle (SHFL) tokens, according to a post shared on September 5 by Arkham Intelligence, a blockchain analytics platform.
The algorithm executed 14 transactions during the attack, transferring approximately $700,000 in USDC and WETH loans through decentralized finance platforms such as Aave and Uniswap, according to Arkham’s data.
The bot only generated a profit of slightly more than $20 after accounting for petrol expenses, despite the significant financial fluctuations.
Etherscan data indicates that the computer completed the entire sequence of transactions within a single block, which equates to approximately 12 seconds.
The Mechanism of a Sandwich Attack
In order to manipulate the token price and extract a profit, an attacker places two transactions around a victim’s pending transaction in a sandwich attack.
The attacker puts their own transaction with a higher gas fee in the mempool (the waiting area before it is included in a block) when a user’s transaction is sent.
This transaction is processed first, followed by a lower gas fee transaction that is processed subsequent to the first.
This allows the perpetrator to purchase tokens at a discounted price and resell them within the same block, thereby profiting from the price disparity after gas fees are deducted.
Despite the fact that this particular bot’s endeavor was unsuccessful, MEV bots have historically generated substantial profits for their operators.
In April 2023, the notorious bot operator “jaredfromsubway” reportedly earned more than $1 million in a single week by conducting sandwich attacks on memecoin traders who dealt with PEPE and WOJAK tokens.
The bot’s name is a playful allusion to the Subway sandwich chain and its erstwhile spokesperson, Jared Fogle.
