Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, said Thursday it is investigating reports of a potential security issue. The company’s founder, Changpeng Zhao, said on X that the incident “does look like a hack on Binance.”
Binance said cryptocurrency firms had frozen more than $2.5 billion in funds by Thursday evening. In a later post on X, the company put the verified total at $2.54 billion and said that figure could rise as it works with law enforcement and blockchain intelligence firms. It has not explicitly confirmed that funds were stolen, and it was not immediately clear how much damage hackers could have caused.
Deposits and withdrawals are temporarily suspended while the exchange runs security checks. A Binance spokesperson said user funds are “completely safe.”
Stablecoin issuers Tether and Circle each said they froze funds in response. Circle said it froze more than $800 million, and Tether said it froze more than $1.5 billion. The price of bitcoin fell 3.2% Thursday evening to under $79,000.
Zhao founded Binance in 2017. He pleaded guilty in 2023 to a felony related to failing to prevent money laundering on the platform, and President Donald Trump pardoned him in 2025. Zhao wrote that as a shareholder he expects all user funds to be fully covered.
