Is that the reason behind the rapid drop in the number of nodes as well?
There was a malicious group from central asia running a very large amount of nodes that were continuously dumping. They seemed to have moved on. This is a good thing, as Horizon can now return to its uptrend, and people running nodes now are the legitimate holders. It also means people running nodes will receive a higher amount of HZ every day.
Update: We have identified the issue, identified the solution, testing is successful and we are creating a zip file for people who are experiencing the problem.
People who are stuck on block #236132 are going to have to delete their nhz_db folder and use the one we are about to post to get past that block.
I'll post a download link soon.