On April 25, Aave, which had remained silent for a week, finally made its move. Its service providers threw out a crucial signal on X: Aave, in collaboration with Ether.fi, KelpDAO, LayerZero_Core, Compound, and several other protocols, has officially submitted a governance proposal to the Arbitrum DAO, requesting the release of that batch of ETH that was urgently frozen due to the rsETH-related incident on April 18. This joint lineup almost brings all the core stakeholders of this storm to the same table.

The proposal's demands are not subtle—take the frozen ETH out of the "safe glass cabinet" and inject it into a joint initiative called "DeFi United" to support the recovery of rsETH: on one hand alleviating the tension after on-chain liquidity was drained, and on the other attempting to mend the cracks of confidence among the protocols and users surrounding rsETH. DeFi United is placed in the spotlight as a cross-protocol collaboration framework, hoped to consolidate resources from multiple parties to jointly hedge against the chain reaction of this crisis: lending protocols provide leverage and funding pathways, LRT protocols take on direct exposure, and cross-chain infrastructure is responsible for facilitating asset migration and distribution.

But key information is intentionally left blank: how much ETH is frozen, and how much each party is willing to contribute under the DeFi United framework, no numbers can be found in public documents. Research briefs repeatedly emphasize that various specific amounts circulating in the outside world can currently only be regarded as unverified rumors. In the vacuum of lacking details, the market's gaze naturally focuses on a single determined point—the governance vote of the Arbitrum DAO: whether this batch of ETH will be unfrozen, at what pace, and in what manner it will be injected into DeFi United, all hangs on that vote.

In this game, one side is the on-chain security freeze mechanism that quickly hit the "brake key" after the rsETH incident on April 18, while the other side faces the reality of urgent pressure to restore funding liquidity surrounding the rsETH ecosystem. Protocols like Aave lay this tension out on the table with a joint proposal, also putting the Arbitrum DAO in the spotlight—the upcoming vote will not only decide the whereabouts of this batch of ETH but also serve as a litmus test for observing whether DeFi can shoulder risks and jointly recover through cross-protocol cooperation.

The rsETH Incident Triggers an Emergency Brake on Arbitrum

On April 18, the rsETH-related incident was sounded an "unknown level" security crisis on Arbitrum. The details of the risk were not immediately made public, but enough to trigger the pre-set emergency protocol—Arbitrum's Security Committee and relevant security mechanisms pressed the emergency brake, directly freezing part of the ETH related to the incident path, first stanching the "bleeding point" before discussing diagnosis and surgery.

From the perspective of mechanism design, this is a typical risk disposal logic: before the attack path, technical causes, and fund flows have been clarified, assets that may be on the risk chain are first identified, avoiding further loss spread in an opaque situation. The research brief clearly points out that this batch of ETH was not taken away by hackers but placed under the custody of Arbitrum's governance structure, temporarily locked by security measures to buy time and maintain operational space.

The issue is that freezing is not just "stopping the bleed"; it also inadvertently choked off the key liquidity that could have flowed into the rsETH recovery plan. What the rsETH ecosystem urgently needed after the incident was credible, deployable on-chain funds to support recovery and reconstruction, and this batch of ETH fits these two conditions perfectly—transparent, traceable on-chain, and already removed from the hacker's threat radius, yet it is firmly locked under governance control by the security process.

Since April 18, as time ticked by hour by hour, this batch of frozen ETH underwent a subtle narrative shift: from "risk assets" to "potential rescue fund pool." It is a product of Arbitrum's security emergency mechanisms and the focal point of all subsequent recovery plans—any design wanting to push rsETH out of crisis must confront a reality: the release and use of these funds have already been written into Arbitrum DAO's governance process and voting results.

Thus, a contradiction is clearly outlined: the ETH frozen to control risk objectively locked up the most actionable piece of leverage. How to find a balance between "not easily unbinding the safety valve" and "quickly revitalizing rescue funds," this batch of ETH under governance "supervision" rapidly evolved into the core asset of subsequent parties' games and cooperation, becoming the central counterweight of the entire event narrative.

From Fighting Alone to Banding Together for Self-Rescue: DeFi United

Before the frozen ETH is unlocked, a new name has already emerged: DeFi United. Around this "regulated liquidity," relevant protocols quickly shifted from individual calculations between April 18 and 24, to brewing a set of plans that could be presented externally in a unified manner—once released, the ETH would be centrally injected into this joint plan to provide funds and support for the recovery of rsETH.

In the proposal text, DeFi United is intentionally described as a "cross-protocol collaboration framework" rather than an extension submodule of any single protocol. Its goal is not complex: in the face of a liquidity crisis, temporarily consolidating resources and voice originally scattered across different product lines and asset pools into a common action container. However, how it operates specifically, how profits are distributed, and how risks are allocated, have not yet been disclosed, resembling more of a "wartime alliance" banner born for the crisis rather than a finely polished business structure.

This "alliance" spans nearly all key tracks:
on one side are lending protocols represented by Aave and Compound, typical liquidity infrastructure;
on the other side are LRT protocols like Ether.fi and KelpDAO, standing right at the forefront of the rsETH narrative;
simultaneously, cross-chain infrastructure LayerZero_Core is also on the list, symbolizing the stance of cross-chain channels.
In the joint proposal publicly announced on April 25 by Aave's service provider, these protocols, which originally performed their respective duties and even competed in the daily market, were bundled into a whole, telling Arbitrum DAO the same thing: please release that batch of ETH frozen due to the rsETH event so that it can enter DeFi United to repair this crisis.

Why choose to speak with one voice rather than separately pushing their own chips? On one hand, the disposal of this batch of ETH is firmly in the hands of Arbitrum DAO, and any single protocol's demands are merely the voice of one stakeholder in the governance process; a joint proposal attempts to overlay the demands of multiple key infrastructures to shape a systematic topic of "if not handled, it will involve the entire ecological restoration process." On the other hand, allowing each protocol to act separately, competing for the same limited rescue resources, could result in fragmented rescue plans, twisted priorities, and ultimately, no one getting the solution they truly wanted.

The research brief views this joint action as a case study: when the on-chain security freeze mechanism of Arbitrum collides with the liquidity restoration needs of each protocol, will the DeFi ecosystem slide into a zero-sum game, or can it build a temporary stage for cross-protocol collaboration? DeFi United's attempt is to bind the "big players" like Aave, Compound, Ether.fi, KelpDAO, LayerZero_Core into a common proposal entity within the governance structure's allowable boundaries, using a narrative of banding together for self-rescue to hedge against the helplessness of going solo. As for whether this banner can truly carry that batch of frozen ETH, it is left to the upcoming Arbitrum DAO vote to reveal the answer.

Arbitrum DAO at the Crossroads of Freezing and Releasing

Now, the protagonist of the story has shifted from the afflicted protocols to the Arbitrum DAO holding the "valve"—the batch of ETH frozen by the security mechanisms after the April 18 incident is no longer just a number on-chain but a switch that must be toggled through governance voting.

One path is to continue to maintain the freeze, emphasizing security first.
From a governance narrative perspective, insisting on a frozen stance means that Arbitrum is willing to decisively sacrifice partial liquidity during a crisis to suppress systemic risk, which will be interpreted as a security commitment of "no compromise at the base level": as long as there are unclear risks, funds can be locked up for an extended period. This posture is a reassurance for developers and funds that value foundational security boundaries—they see an infrastructure willing to press the brakes vigorously. However, such a choice will also leave a shadow in another group: once funds are caught up in an accident, even if the problem originated from other protocols, Arbitrum governance may keep this portion of assets in a "not fully available" state for a long time; the uncertainty of governance itself begins to be viewed as a new risk.

The other path is to respond to the joint proposal initiated by protocols like Aave, Ether.fi, KelpDAO, LayerZero_Core, and Compound, choosing to conditionally "release."
On April 25, Aave's service provider confirmed on Platform X that these protocols had jointly submitted a governance proposal to the Arbitrum DAO, requesting the release of ETH related to the rsETH incident currently frozen, and planning to inject it into the joint plan named DeFi United to support the recovery of rsETH. The signal of this path is very direct: Arbitrum is not only willing to assist in restoring the liquidity of damaged protocols afterward, but also willing to acknowledge the status of cross-protocol collaboration in crisis management—after passive freezing, it's about proactive collaboration, pulling originally isolated projects into a "joint rescue" scenario framed by DeFi United. This will greatly restore the expectations of relevant protocols, allowing people to see that infrastructure and upper-level protocols can "sail in the same boat." But it equally means another long-term consequence: once this release becomes a reality, in future similar incidents, all eyes will quickly turn to the Arbitrum DAO—will you save again? To what extent? With whose assets to save?

Whether freezing or releasing, this choice is reshaping the governance brand of Arbitrum.
If leaning toward safety freezing, Arbitrum can strengthen its narrative as "the last firewall": when technical details are not yet clarified, and attack paths and fund flows are opaque, governance would rather sacrifice speed than abandon the safety bottom line. Every emergency response in the future will be compared to this one—will they be tougher than this time, or will they start to relent? Conversely, if the DAO chooses to release funds according to the joint proposal and support DeFi United, it will be seen as a sample case for the DeFi ecosystem's collaborative crisis management: the foundational governance structure is no longer just a power center of "deciding whether to freeze," but also the object of "lobbying" and "forming alliances" by various protocols, and the governance vote itself becomes a public coordination game. This will greatly affect external expectations of Arbitrum's risk management—some may see it as a replicable rescue template, while others will start calculating whether governance will be "kidnapped" by recurring crises.

More importantly, this vote will become a reference point for future similar events.
The research brief has clearly regarded this incident as an important sample for observing whether the DeFi ecosystem can shoulder risks and jointly recover through cross-protocol collaboration, and the voting results of the Arbitrum DAO will determine the direction of this sample—will it be written as a textbook of "safety mechanisms first," or as a model of "liquidity recovery first," or will it be forced to find an awkward compromise between the two. The demonstrative effect brought by this "first case" will be repeatedly cited in every subsequent emergency governance: when other chains face similar situations, developers, investors, and governance participants will directly take Arbitrum's handling this time as a template to demand or resist similar decisions.

The suspense is that the outside world does not even see the timeline for this vote.
Currently available information does not provide a specific voting timetable for the Arbitrum DAO regarding this joint proposal, nor does it disclose the exact review stage of this proposal in the governance process, and research briefs also do not offer more internal progress information. How the proposal text will be modified, how the supporting and opposing forces will pull and tug within the community, how governance participants will weigh their voting costs against reputation risks—these details are all still buried in forum and private communications. The frozen ETH lies quietly on-chain, everyone knows that the next step must be decided by the DAO, but no one can say when and in what posture this decision will be made. This information void becomes part of the event, adding a heavier layer of uncertainty to Arbitrum's hesitation between freezing and releasing.

The Risk Resonance of Multi-Chain Lending and LRT Passively Involved

While Arbitrum is weighing between freezing and unfreezing, another front has quietly formed outside the chain: those protocols deeply bound to rsETH, yet not the "initiators" of the incident, are forced to stand on the edge of the storm together. Old lending brands like Aave and Compound, new LRT elites like Ether.fi and KelpDAO, along with a cross-chain underlying channel like LayerZero_Core, have all passively formed a temporary community of fate in this upheaval originating from Arbitrum.

The starting point of the rsETH incident was on Arbitrum, but its impact was not confined by the borders of that chain. As collateral assets, sources of income, and cross-chain flow "tickets," the same batch of liquidity related to rsETH traverses between different protocols increasingly frequent, the more characters involved when the incident erupted:
● For lending protocols, the assets related to rsETH are tied to the security of the overall funding pool;
● For LRT protocols, rsETH itself is a carrier of brand and reputation;
● For cross-chain infrastructure, any anomaly on one end could transmit to users and integrators on the other end through cross-chain connections.

When on April 25, Aave's service provider spoke out on X, announcing that it had jointly submitted a proposal to the Arbitrum DAO along with Ether.fi, KelpDAO, LayerZero_Core, and Compound, a clear clue emerged: these protocols are not acting in isolated "self-rescue," but are attempting to share the same shock across a larger, more coordinated framework. The joint proposal requests the release of the batch of ETH frozen due to the April 18 rsETH incident and plans to inject it into a joint plan named DeFi United to support the recovery of rsETH—this means that the response capability originally scattered across different protocols has been actively gathered under the same "command center."

LayerZero_Core's presence gives this storm a clear cross-chain color. It does not issue assets directly or manage positions directly, yet connects the demands, expectations, and pressures across different chains through cross-chain infrastructure: a freezing decision on Arbitrum is no longer just a matter for one chain but will amplify its consequences through cross-chain and cross-protocol connections on a larger scale. The "attack radius" of a single event has thus been silently extended by the underlying connecting layer.

From the start, DeFi United has been set up as a cross-protocol collaboration framework aimed at concentrating multiple resources to jointly address the liquidity crisis, rather than letting a single protocol bear all uncertainties. After the rsETH incident, this setup was fully activated for the first time in a real crisis: lending protocols (Aave, Compound), LRT protocols (Ether.fi, KelpDAO), and cross-chain infrastructure (LayerZero_Core) all appear in the same governance proposal's signature line, attempting to negotiate with Arbitrum DAO, which holds the power to unfreeze.

The research brief views this scene as a case of collaborative trends in the DeFi ecosystem's crisis response, not because it provides a perfect answer, but because it exposes a new structural issue: when assets, income, and liquidity can be shared across multiple protocols, risks will also be shared; and when risks truly materialize, crises will be synchronized and amplified along the same paths. Those connections praised as "composability" during stable times can quickly transform into "resonance chambers" during turbulent moments.

This forces all participants to think a step further: in the face of the next similar event, should we rely on temporary coalition-like joint proposals, or is there a need for a more systematic collaborative mechanism—including who will take the lead at the first opportunity, how to allocate responsibilities and resources between different protocols, and how to find a common bottom line between safety freezing and liquidity recovery. The rsETH incident may offer not just an arbitrage game with an undetermined outcome but a mirror reflecting new questions that the highly coupled DeFi world must jointly answer when encountering shocks.

The Script After the Crisis: Can Governance Write a New Template?

The rsETH incident here does not have an "ending," but feels more like a halftime break. The sudden shock on April 18 pushed Arbitrum's security freeze mechanism to the forefront: the security committee or on-chain mechanisms froze part of the ETH within a short time, locking risks inside the governance framework; while the unfreezing proposal jointly signed by Aave, Ether.fi, KelpDAO, LayerZero_Core, and Compound on April 25 brings the post-recovery mechanism into the spotlight—how should the frozen funds be "unlocked," who should allocate them, and where they will be used, is what deserves the entire ecosystem's risk structure.

From this perspective, this batch of ETH custodial by the DAO on Arbitrum, which must be released through governance voting, is no longer just a number but a test to determine whether it can quickly hit the pause button and whether it can orderly press the recovery button:
● On the freezing end, it demonstrates the public chain's emergency capability against uncertain attack surfaces;
● On the recovery end, it asks whether DeFi protocols can arrange a credible repair path through transparent governance when liquidity is impaired.

DeFi United, as the shell of the joint plan, is defined as a cross-protocol collaboration and recovery framework—lending protocols (Aave, Compound), LRT protocols (Ether.fi, KelpDAO), and cross-chain infrastructure (LayerZero_Core) are brought to the same table, attempting to reassemble their respective resources and interests into a "shared risks, joint recovery" solution. The question remains whether this will be remembered as a patchwork joint action or whether it will become a standard template for future crisis management; currently, no one can provide an answer.

If this combination of unfreezing + injecting into DeFi United ultimately receives approval from Arbitrum DAO, it may rewrite several layers of expectations:
● For cross-protocol collaboration, the market will begin to assume: once a shock like rsETH occurs, different protocols won't just "protect their own treasure chests," but will swiftly enter a joint response under some preset framework;
● For public chains like Arbitrum, safety freezing will no longer just be an "emergency brake," but must be discussed in conjunction with subsequent uses of funds and recovery rhythms—governance will not just decide "to freeze or not," but must provide predictable answers to "when, how, and safely unfreeze and reallocate to liquidity."

But at least as of April 25, 2026, the most critical variables remain hanging in the air. The research brief clearly points out: the specific number of frozen ETH, the definite amounts proposed by each party, and the total scale of the attack incident have not been confirmed in public, verifiable information; various numbers circulating in the outside world are marked as "to be verified information." The timetable for the Arbitrum DAO's governance vote and the current review phase have not been made public, and the voting results cannot be discussed at all, while how DeFi United, as a framework, will be implemented and how risks and benefits will be allocated remain at the conceptual and proposal text level.

This means that what can be done now is not to rush to judgment but to keep a close watch on the rhythm: on one hand, observing the subsequent disclosures from Arbitrum DAO regarding formal governance proposals, voting arrangements, and voting results, and on the other hand, checking multi-source information and maintaining a reserved attitude towards all unverifiable numbers and details. The rsETH incident has been placed on the observation seat of "Can cross-protocol cooperation weather the crisis," but whether this script ultimately becomes a successful governance template or a hasty patch job will only be qualified for validation after the on-chain voting and execution are completed step by step.

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