Binance increases withdrawals after hacker attack and withdrawals reach US$5.16 billion

Binance expanded the release of withdrawals after the hacker attack suffered by the exchange on Thursday (29). According to DefiLlama, cited by Times Brasil, accumulated withdrawals already total US$5.165 billion, equivalent to around R$28 billion. Times Brasil and InfoMoney report that the platform now allows withdrawals in five currencies: US dollar, United Arab Emirates dirham, Vietnamese dong, Philippine peso and Indonesian rupiah.

According to Seu Dinheiro, the attack resulted in the theft of around US$6.3 billion in crypto. Binance reopened withdrawals on Sunday (November 1) and, between the morning and afternoon of that day, recorded a net outflow of around US$3.64 billion, with withdrawals of US$4.649 billion and deposits of US$1.01 billion. In a publication on X, the company stated that this net outflow is equivalent to 2.1% of assets under management.

The exchange team continues to test remaining networks and assets and promised to detail the next phase "as soon as possible." In the same vein, the company states that market conditions are stable.

The episode also reached other brokers. On Monday (2), Mercado Bitcoin reported a security incident following the attack on Binance and preventively and temporarily blocked deposits and withdrawals. The company did not disclose the official amount diverted. Unofficial on-chain trackers, cited by Seu Dinheiro, indicate around US$40 million moved from addresses possibly linked to the Bitcoin Market.

The case brings together two sensitive points: the ability of a large platform to sustain large-scale withdrawals and the risk of security incidents affecting other brokers. As long as the amount diverted in the Bitcoin Market is not disclosed, the scale of the problem for local customers remains without precise measurement.

What changes for the investor

For those who invest and operate, the episode is a reminder of the risk of custody on centralized platforms, which are exposed to attacks, temporary blocks and doubts about the speed of withdrawals, even when they say they are normalizing operations. The release of withdrawals in dollars and other currencies indicates that part of the payment structure is working again, but the negative net balance shows that a significant volume of resources left the platform in a few hours. Large outflows from a broker can weigh on liquidity and increase short-term volatility, without making it possible to predict the direction of prices. It is worth monitoring the disclosure of the value diverted by the Bitcoin Market, the next phase announced by Binance and the net flow of withdrawals in the coming days.

Automatically translated from Portuguese.