Binance hack: outflow estimates rise to as much as $5.8B

Updated Oct 29, 5:57 PM ET: outflow estimates grew, from $3.3B to as much as $5.8B depending on the count.

At least $3.3B left Binance hot wallets on Oct. 29, and Coinbase analyst Conor Grogan puts suspicious outflows as high as $5.8B, The Block reports. Founder Changpeng Zhao (CZ) wrote: "User funds are safe! It looks like Binance was indeed hacked." Binance itself has not officially confirmed a breach.

Details

According to The Block, analyst Spreek counted about $3.55B in incoming transfers to an unlabeled wallet, with roughly $900M later moved on across other wallets. Security firm Blockaid is looking into suspicious outflows of about $3.3B across Ethereum, Arbitrum and Avalanche. The $5.8B figure is Grogan's alone, and there is no final loss total.

The first transfer came at 4:24 PM ET from the Binance 14 wallet: 167,464 ETH (about $388M) plus 63 other tokens, per Blockchain Reporter. Tether and Circle froze about $1.79B in USDT and USDC combined. Early reports cited $971M in USDT and $823M in USDC (Cryptobriefing); a later figure of $1.567B in USDT does not match those, and we have no primary source for it.

Binance said it is aware of reports of a possible security issue and is investigating. CZ added that as a shareholder he expects user funds to be fully covered and thanked Tether and Circle for the freezes (TechFlow).

What this means for the market

BNB was down more than 5.5% when The Block published, and the market saw a wave of liquidations: $627.7M within an hour, with BTC dipping below $79,000, per Blockchain Reporter. See the daily brief for the live price. A freeze does not automatically return funds, and the cause of the breach and the size of the loss are not yet established. We will update this story.

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