Binance is investigating a suspected security breach after billions of dollars moved from wallets associated with the exchange on Thursday, October 29, 2026. The company said approximately $2.54 billion in related crypto assets had been frozen, while withdrawals were temporarily paused for security checks. Binance has not established the final amount stolen or publicly identified an attacker.

An Ethereum transaction recorded at 20:24 UTC shows a wallet labeled Binance 14 sending approximately 167,464 ether alongside tokens including roughly 1.6 billion USDT to a newly created address. Other Binance-linked wallets subsequently sent assets to the same destination. Analysts have estimated the wider suspicious outflows at between $3.3 billion and $5.8 billion, but transfers do not automatically establish the amount permanently lost.

The incident first attracted widespread attention through Cointelegraph’s breaking report and other posts tracking blockchain activity. The Block reported multiple different on-chain estimates as the investigation unfolded.

Binance suspends withdrawals and promises to cover losses

Co-founder Changpeng Zhao, who no longer manages Binance, said the incident appeared to be a hack and expected customers to be fully covered. Binance co-founder Yi He subsequently said the exchange would cover hacking losses. The company said customer funds remained safe and warned users against unofficial recovery links and requests for account credentials.

The security response involved several token issuers. Reuters reported that Tether froze nearly $1.57 billion in USDT and Circle more than $800 million in USDC, with other organizations also blocking affected assets. A freeze stops certain tokens from being transferred but does not itself mean the assets have been returned.

How the suspected breach affected the market

Researchers are examining the possibility that Ethereum’s EIP-7702 account-delegation mechanism was involved in an unauthorized wallet operation. That is a technical theory based on transaction activity, not a root cause confirmed by Binance. Watcher.Guru and a Cointelegraph follow-up reported further developments as token freezes spread.

The disclosures rattled cryptocurrency markets. Associated Press reported that Bitcoin fell below $79,000 on Thursday, while BNB and other tokens also declined. Market prices may reflect investor concern but do not reveal how much cryptocurrency is recoverable.

The next milestones are Binance’s promised incident review, resumption of normal withdrawals and an accounting of any customer impact. The episode adds to industry concerns after previous attacks on exchanges and wallets, including the Bitget-related fund movements, hardware-wallet tampering and phishing targeting wallet owners.

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