User spent $100,000 on a mint of invalid Rune
Almost $100,000 worth of Bitcoin was lost in unsuccessful attempts to mint on the Rune Protocol, as reported by the Ordinals and Runes tracking platform Ord.io. This past Wednesday, the tracker disclosed via a tweet that user efforts to create Rune 777, known as LEEROY JENKINS, resulted in the loss of 1.365 BTC, approximately $97,662.
The Runes project introduces a non-fungible token system on the Bitcoin blockchain, enabling participants to mint tokens on the foremost blockchain system.
“The way Runes minting works is there is a mint window in which all Runes minting transactions are valid,” pseudonymous Ord co-founder Leonidas said —for example, from block 840,000 to block 841,000. “Towards the end of every Runes mint, people rush to get their mint transactions mined before the window closes.”
In the mentioned scenario, should a minting transaction be confirmed in block 841,001, the minting party would pay the network fees for nothing.
Leonidas stated, that missing the minting window means your BTC is spent without acquiring any Runes. This is a fundamental aspect of how the protocol functions. According to him, during the final moments of a minting event, the desire to mint exceeds the available space within a blockchain block.
The Ord platform notes that LEEROY JENKINS has a total available quantity of 69.4 million and presently boasts 1,350 owners. Out of 57,850 successful mints, 276 were declared invalid—and those unfortunate minters are left with no way to turn it back.
“Bitcoin is not aware of the Runes protocol and does not have the capability to use logic the way a smart contract would to refund invalid mints. To the Bitcoin network, a Runes mint is just a meaningless piece of data.”
