Paradex failure rollback triggers an on-chain DEX reliability crisis, where does the decentralized Perp contract platform go from here?

【Blockchain Rhythm】Starknet ecosystem’s perpetual contract DEX Paradex experienced a system crisis on January 20th. The originally planned temporary maintenance was extended, and the protocol failed to go live for a long time, leading the community to rumor that the platform encountered serious technical vulnerabilities. Many traders’ perpetual contract positions were forcibly liquidated under abnormally high funding rates.

By around 15:00 in the afternoon, Paradex’s official statement revealed the truth—that a system interruption occurred during database maintenance and migration. Even more outrageous, the BTC price within the platform was transmitted as zero, triggering a chain reaction of large-scale forced liquidations. To restore order, the platform chose an aggressive solution: rolling back the chain state to block 1604710 (corresponding to 04:27:54 UTC), the last confirmed correct state before maintenance. At 20:13 in the evening, Paradex finally went back online.

This incident ignited anger within the crypto community. Criticism regarding the trustworthiness of on-chain DEXs surged. The security and true decentralization of Perp DEX platforms built on L2 architectures were questioned. Some even believe that these products have been misguided from the start—facing extreme scenarios, the so-called “decentralization” often reverts to centralized control under the guise of “system repair.”

The voices from the Solana community resonated. Some members pointed out that Solana’s more decentralized validator infrastructure helps prevent unauthorized chain rollbacks or system shutdowns caused by hackers or fund conflicts. The importance of consensus mechanisms is obvious, but the current question is: in DEXs, does the “D” (decentralization) still truly exist?