Binance covers 90% of losses from record $6.3bn crypto hack

Binance says it has covered 90% of the $6.3bn (£4.7bn) in assets stolen in a hack on Thursday, adding that the remaining 10% may take longer to source in the required amounts. The world's largest cryptocurrency exchange has consistently pledged to cover 100% of the losses from what is suspected to be crypto's biggest hack on record, and said it has set aside more than $6.34bn in company funds to do so. "Binance will absorb the financial impact of these stolen funds, not our users," the company said in a statement on Saturday. It said it had replenished the assets using various funds and its own corporate treasury. All holdings of bitcoin, ethereum and Tether are covered, along with seven other widely traded crypto assets. The company said its next goal is resuming withdrawal services for users. It remains on track to reopen withdrawals on Sunday 1 November and will provide a further update once details are confirmed. The hack is believed to be the largest in history, eclipsing the $1.5bn heist on the Bybit exchange in 2025. Binance's initial investigation suggested an engineer's laptop was compromised, which allowed access to unauthorised withdrawals, but a later update said investigators had uncovered "additional points of breach". Richard Teng, Binance's co-chief executive officer, said the attack was carried out by more than one person and that the hackers used sophisticated methods to hide their tracks, including a "self-destruct mechanism". On Friday, the company said it had frozen around $3bn of stolen assets after working with law enforcement, intelligence firms and partners. The investigation is ongoing. The US Secret Service said the same day that it is "working around the clock" with private sector partners "to identify, freeze, trace, and recover funds" stolen from Binance. Two major blockchain analytics firms say they have robust intelligence pointing to the Lazarus Group, a North Korean state-backed group also known as TraderTraitor, as the likely culprits. The Federal Bureau of Investigation said North Korea was responsible for the theft of $1.5bn from Bybit last year. North Korea has always denied involvement in such attacks. Binance, founded in China in 2017, lets users buy, sell and trade digital assets and is estimated to have hundreds of millions of users worldwide.