The value of Normie (NORMIE) plummeted 99% in less than three hours following a smart contract exploit, devastating its market cap from nearly $42 million to $200,000.

The team behind Base memecoin Normie (NORMIE) is in talks with a hacker to recover 90% of the stolen funds after a smart contract vulnerability led to a catastrophic drop in the token’s value. This exploit caused the token’s market capitalization to plunge by $41.7 million in a matter of hours.

Blockchain analytics firm Lookonchain was among the first to detect the exploit and the hacker’s subsequent offer, communicated through an on-chain message to Normie’s deployer address on May 26. The hacker proposed returning 90% of the stolen NORMIE tokens, provided the Normie team uses these funds along with $2.3 million from the team’s development wallet to issue a new token to reimburse NORMIE holders.

Despite the offer, the Normie team is grappling with significant challenges. The price of NORMIE had already dropped 96% by the time they reportedly agreed to the hacker's conditions. The hacker also demanded immunity from reprisals, insisting that a token relaunch occurs before returning the funds. They argued that this would ensure the appropriate use of the recovered funds, emphasizing that the development wallet had profited more from the exploit than the hacker.

In a statement on a newly created X account, which replaced their suspended main account, the Normie team confirmed the necessity of a token relaunch. "We will have to re-launch, yes," they stated, outlining that the relaunch would follow the recovery of their primary Twitter account and the retrieval of funds from the hacker. This temporary account was also suspended shortly thereafter.

The timeline for when NORMIE token holders might recover their stolen funds remains unclear. "Dinho," an administrator of the official NORMIE Telegram group, was unable to provide a definite answer, as his X account was also suspended.

The exploit caused NORMIE’s price to collapse from $0.040 to $0.0032 within an hour on May 26, according to CoinGecko, marking a dramatic 92% drop. The token's value continued to fall, reaching as low as $0.0016, amounting to a 96% decline. Despite a brief recovery spike to $0.019, the price trajectory has remained downward.

The exploit has also impacted the token's market cap, which hit a low of $200,000 but has since shown minor recovery. According to Quick Intel, a blockchain scam detection tool, the exploit affected approximately 72,000 NORMIE holders. The vulnerability had been identified back in March, yet it remains unclear how much was stolen in total.

Normie was launched during a wave of memecoin enthusiasm on Base in March 2024 and had achieved a peak market cap of $130 million by April 2, according to CoinGecko. A recent investigation by Cointelegraph highlighted that 91% of Base memecoins possess vulnerabilities that could expose users to significant financial losses.

As the Normie team navigates this crisis, the broader community awaits further developments and potential resolutions to recover the stolen funds and stabilize the token’s value.