The world’s largest cryptocurrency by market value fell as much as 3.1 per cent to around $76,300, while Binance’s BNB token lost approximately 5 per cent over 24 hours, trading at about $700. Several other digital currencies, including tokens reportedly affected by the breach, also recorded significant losses.
The incident, which has been described as the largest cryptocurrency theft on record, has renewed questions about the security of major trading platforms and the protection of investors’ digital assets.
Binance Faces Fresh Security Questions
The reported breach has dealt another setback to an industry that has struggled for years with hacking incidents, fraud and exchange failures.
Data from DefiLlama showed that Binance held more than $135 billion in assets on its platform, highlighting the scale of the responsibility involved in safeguarding customers’ funds.
In response to the incident, Binance disclosed on Friday that it had set aside $6.34 billion in company funds.
Jeff Ko, chief analyst at ViaBTC, said the wider cryptocurrency market was already showing signs of weakness before the incident, making it easier for negative sentiment to spread.
He also suggested that Binance had the financial capacity to absorb the losses.
Bitcoin Under Pressure From Wider Market Conditions
The decline in Bitcoin’s value was not driven by the Binance incident alone. Digital currencies were already facing pressure from weaker conditions across financial markets and growing caution among investors towards riskier assets.
Futures linked to the Nasdaq 100 fell 2.4 per cent before the market opened, following disappointing earnings reports from major companies, including Amazon.com Inc. and Intel Corp.
Bitcoin had traded around $80,000 for much of the week before Friday’s sharp decline. Traders were also preparing for the expiry of cryptocurrency options worth approximately $11 billion on Deribit, an event that raised concerns about increased market volatility.
Data from Coinglass showed that about $1.3 billion in bullish cryptocurrency positions had been liquidated within 24 hours. The development reflected the pressure on traders who had been betting that digital asset prices would continue to rise.
The combination of the reported Binance breach, weakness in traditional financial markets and heavy liquidations added to the negative mood across the cryptocurrency sector.
How the Binance Security Breach Happened
The October 29 incident reportedly involved the theft of more than $6 billion in cryptocurrency from digital wallets held at Binance. Initial accounts of the attack indicated that hackers exploited an engineer’s laptop to gain access to a service container, allowing them to initiate unauthorised withdrawal transactions.
Blockchain intelligence firms, including TRM Labs, Pangolin Intelligence and Chainalysis, have linked the attack to North Korean cybercriminals. However, investigations into the incident are still ongoing.
Following the breach, a coalition of cryptocurrency companies reportedly succeeded in freezing approximately $3 billion worth of the stolen assets in an effort to prevent further movement of the funds.
Binance also temporarily suspended deposits and withdrawals while carrying out security checks. The exchange revoked authorisation linked to the affected address and contacted law enforcement agencies and blockchain intelligence firms to assist with investigations and recovery efforts.
The scale of the reported theft is particularly alarming when compared with losses recorded across the entire cryptocurrency industry in previous years. According to Chainalysis, cryptocurrency thefts amounted to $3.4 billion in 2025, while hackers linked to North Korea were responsible for at least $2.02 billion of those losses.
The latest incident has once again highlighted the security risks facing the cryptocurrency industry, particularly as major exchanges continue to hold enormous amounts of digital assets. It has also reinforced concerns about the ability of trading platforms to protect customer funds against increasingly sophisticated cyberattacks.
