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The limited impact of the USD 6.3 billion Binance hack on Bitcoin trading suggests that the cryptocurrency market has become more resilient to exchange-specific shocks, reducing the risk of liquidity disruptions, according to Fitch Ratings.
The rating agency said Bitcoin's relatively limited price decline and a sharp increase in trading volumes following the attack indicated that the market was better able to absorb exchange-specific disruptions than during previous major incidents. The attack began on October 29, with around USD 6.3 billion in digital assets stolen from Binance across multiple blockchains, in what may be the largest cryptocurrency theft to date. The stolen assets reportedly included around 18,270 bitcoins, valued at approximately USD 1.5 billion at the time. Binance temporarily halted trading and withdrawals following the attack before beginning to restore withdrawal services on November 1. Bitcoin fell around 6 per cent in the 10 hours after initial reports of the hack. However, its daily trading volume increased 67 per cent to around USD 40.9 billion, compared with an average of USD 27 billion over the preceding 30 days, according to CoinMarketCap data cited by Fitch. "The price movement was fairly contained, in our view, and was well below bitcoin's most severe declines," the report said. Fitch compared the reaction with earlier market shocks, including a 35 per cent fall during the Covid crisis in March 2020, a 14 per cent decline following the collapse of FTX in 2022 and a 21 per cent drop during the Bitstamp exchange hack in 2015. The agency attributed the relatively limited disruption to a deeper and more diversified cryptocurrency trading ecosystem, which has reduced dependence on individual exchanges and helped maintain liquidity even when a major platform faces operational problems. The development is significant for bitcoin-backed securities, where the ability to sell pledged assets quickly during price declines is important for limiting losses. Fitch said such products require adequate collateral coverage, short liquidation periods and the ability to execute transactions across multiple trading platforms. However, the agency cautioned that the Binance attack also highlighted cybersecurity as an operational risk, as successful attacks can restrict access to assets and delay the liquidation of collateral. Fitch said the incident did not change its existing assessment of bitcoin-backed securities, but could provide further evidence of improving market resilience, subject to its final analysis of prices, trading volumes and market depth. (ANI)
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