$1.53 Billion in Liquidations Sends Bitcoin to $76,300 After Binance Breach
Key Facts
Bitcoin fell to about $76,300 on October 30, while forced liquidations of cryptocurrency positions totaled $1.53 billion over 24 hours through Friday morning in Asia, according to CoinDesk, citing CoinGlass data. Binance said its hot wallets were breached on October 29 and estimated that about $6.3 billion in digital assets were affected. That figure is an estimate of losses in assets affected by the breach, not the value of positions forcibly liquidated in the market. Long bets, based on expectations of rising prices, accounted for 83.8% of total liquidations. In the stock market, the Nasdaq Composite fell 2.9% in the October 30 session, with the S&P 500 and Dow also declining, according to the Associated Press.
Binance said the breach occurred at about 20:05 UTC on October 29, resulting in estimated losses of about $6.3 billion in digital assets. The company added that it had frozen about $3 billion of affected assets on-chain as of its October 30 update. It said it had allocated more than $6.34 billion in company funds to cover losses, including $5 billion of the affected assets themselves. The platform temporarily suspended withdrawals for security reviews, while saying unaffected deposits and other services continued to operate. In its update, Binance said: "About $3 billion has been frozen on-chain so far."
Binance said its initial investigation pointed to the possible involvement of a compromised laptop, but that a subsequent investigation uncovered additional points of compromise. It added that it found no evidence that wallet private keys had been leaked. The company said Circle and Tether had frozen assets linked to the incident; Circle estimated its frozen assets at more than $800 million, while Tether said it had frozen the equivalent of more than $1.5 billion. The measures were among the steps announced by the stablecoin companies and the platform after the breach was discovered. Binance said the security investigation was ongoing and that it would share further technical findings after they had been verified.
Bitcoin fell to about $76,460 during trading on October 30 before recovering toward $78,500, according to CoinDesk. EL7 data showed it closed at $77,368.77 that day, compared with a close of $77,991.89 on October 29. EL7 data recorded a daily close of $77,543.01 on October 31. CoinDesk reported that the cryptocurrency was down 8.4% in October and was on track for its second consecutive monthly decline. Bitcoin fell 3.95% in October 2025, despite rising in 10 of the 13 Octobers from 2013 to 2025, with an average return of 18.5% in those months.
Pressure from the October 30 session extended to U.S. stock indexes: the S&P 500 lost 1.8%, its worst day since June, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 1.1%, alongside a 2.9% drop in the Nasdaq Composite, according to the Associated Press. The agency attributed the decline in technology stocks to concerns that investor enthusiasm for artificial intelligence had pushed prices to elevated levels. It also cited investor concern about the scale of companies' spending on the technology. The session's losses came as Bitcoin was trading near its cited intraday lows, following large liquidations in the cryptocurrency market. The markets thus recorded simultaneous pressure on technology stocks and digital assets during the same session.
Binance aims to begin resuming withdrawals in about 34 hours from its October 30 update, in stages and after completing security checks. The company said it plans to conduct an initial proof-of-reserves snapshot within 12 hours, with results to be published by Monday, November 2. It also expected to share further technical findings in about 48 hours, once verified. In the United States, the Institute for Supply Management's manufacturing PMI report is due on November 2 at 10:00 a.m. Eastern time, according to the institute's schedule. The Federal Election Commission has set November 3, 2026, as the date of the next federal general election.