Ethereum Reserves on Binance Fall to 2.9 Million, Lowest Since 2021
Key Facts
CryptoQuant analyst Darkfost estimated that Binance’s Ethereum reserves stood at about 2.9 million units on November 15, the lowest level since 2021. The decline in the platform’s estimated balance coincides with a drop in the token’s price and pressure on flows into U.S. spot funds. Darkfost said the 30-day average of net Ethereum flows to Binance remained negative for most of the period, meaning withdrawals generally exceeded deposits. This pattern points to units leaving the platform, but does not by itself establish where they went or why their owners moved them. The decline in reserves therefore remains a measure of a change in the tracked balance, not conclusive evidence that investors bought Ethereum or decided to hold it for the long term.
The report said Ethereum’s price touched $1,713.65 during the November 15 session, down about 19.5% over seven days. That puts the decline in reserves in the context of a market that saw a sharp price drop over the same week. Meanwhile, U.S. spot Ethereum funds recorded net outflows of about $398.9 million between November 9 and 13, according to Farside Investors data cited by the report. The outflows from those funds coincided with the price decline, but neither indicator on its own establishes the cause of the other’s move. Nor do fund-flow figures or withdrawals from Binance reveal the intentions of each investor or the path taken by each unit.
Binance’s official proof-of-reserves snapshot presents a different measure of customer balances. Customers held 3,482,001 Ethereum units in the November 12 snapshot, compared with 3,446,090 on November 4. Those figures are higher than the estimated reserves reading of about 2.9 million units, but the two measures do not describe the same thing: the first is a snapshot of customer balances on two specific dates, while the second is an estimate of the platform’s tracked reserves on November 15. Binance provided the latest snapshot as part of proof of reserves covering 198 tokens. The platform said users would be able to verify that their balances were backed at a minimum of 1:1 once the full zero-knowledge proof was completed.
The figures follow a security incident in which Binance said its hot wallets were targeted on October 29, 2026, at about 20:05 UTC, resulting in the loss of about $6.3 billion in tokenized assets. On October 30, the platform said it had frozen about $3 billion of the affected assets on-chain by that date, and that withdrawals had been temporarily suspended during security checks. In the same statement, it said it had allocated more than $6.34 billion in company funds, including $5 billion in the same affected tokens, to cover about 80% of the amount affected at the time. By October 31, Binance said coverage of the affected assets had risen to 90%, and Ethereum and nine other tokens were fully covered at 100%. These developments provide a timeline for the reserve figures, without establishing that the incident caused the change in the estimated balance on November 15.
In a separate technical update, Binance said the last unauthorized transfer amounted to 2,961.9 Ethereum, with the on-chain transaction completed at 23:56 UTC on October 29. It added that it had detected no further unauthorized transfers. The platform said proof of reserves taken at 00:00 UTC on October 31 was completed by November 2, allowing users of the 10 named tokens to independently verify that their balances were backed at a minimum of 1:1. It also said the first phase of the gradual resumption of withdrawals was scheduled between 06:00 and 09:00 UTC on November 1, following precautionary measures, security assessments and readiness checks for affected services. In an update on November 12, it said generating the full zero-knowledge proof for the latest snapshot was expected to take about 40 to 50 hours, after which holders of the relevant tokens could verify coverage at a minimum of 1:1.