Morning Minute: The Binance Hack Leads to Mass Outflows while FBI Opens Probe

Morning Minute is a daily newsletter written by Tyler Warner. The analysis and opinions expressed are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of Decrypt. And check out our daily news show 'FOMO HOUR' covering all of the top stories and market action.

GM!

Today’s top news:

Crypto majors chop over weekend in Binance hack aftermath; BTC at $77.6k

Binance turns on withdrawals post-hack, sees $3.64B exodus

FBI and Secret Service open probes into Binance hack

BTC ETFs lose $643M in outflows on Friday, flip October to red

Nvidia and Micron added to list of companies objecting to tokenized shares on OKXICE, now at 50

💸 The Binance Hack Just Cost Bitcoin ETFs Their Whole Month

Through Thursday, October was a quiet, slightly positive month for Bitcoin ETFs. Then North Korea took $6.4 billion out of Binance five minutes after the closing bell, and Friday’s single session erased the entire month.

To recap the Binance hack, attackers drained roughly $6.4 billion from Binance’s hot wallets across about 10 blockchains, with most of it inside 20 minutes on Thursday afternoon. That’s more than four times the old record, the $1.5 billion Bybit theft in February 2025. Both firms attribute it to TraderTraitor, the North Korea-linked group that also hit Bybit.

The entry point has changed since Friday. Binance first blamed a compromised laptop belonging to a DevOps engineer, then found “additional points of breach.” On Ethereum, the attacker used 50 pre-signed authorizations to turn a Binance hot wallet into a contract that emptied itself—a failure of Binance’s own signing approvals, not of Ethereum. No private keys leaked. The attacker wiped its tooling on the way out.

Friday was the aftermath, and it was bloody. Bitcoin ETFs bled $643.3 million on Friday, the biggest day of the month, ending a four-session buying streak. That one day took October from +$127 million to −$515.9 million. September was +$2.65 billion. The ETH ETFs were worse: −$1.61 billion for October, their worst month since launch, and an 11-session losing streak into the weekend.

Now the biggest players in the U.S. government are reacting. CFTC Chairman Michael Selig told CNBC the hack “proves our exact point.” “The real issue here is that these are unregulated offshore exchanges, and they don’t have the same sorts of safeguards.” He’s pitching a “federal option”—let offshore venues register with the CFTC and meet US cybersecurity standards. He also notes the hole came in “from someone’s laptop,” not from a blockchain. The FBI and Secret Service have also both opened probes.

Binance CEO Richard Teng says the company covers every dollar from corporate funds and SAFU, with $6.34 billion already set aside. CZ: “It hurts, but we survive.” Withdrawals were turned back on over the weekend and over $3.6B has exited so far according to QCP.

So what to watch from here? Monday’s inflows (or outflows) will be telling. If Friday’s bleeding continues to Monday, it’s a signal that the pain might just be beginning. Also, watch Binance. They have to buy roughly $1.3 billion of BTC, ETH, and BNB on the open market and OTC to top off the reimbursement pool—a forced bid underneath a market that just got hit. And then there’s Selig and the FBI; be on the lookout from updates from those agencies as the Binance hack aftermath carries forward.

🌎 Macro Crypto and Markets

Crypto majors are mixed in the Binance hack aftermath; BTC -0.3% at $77.6k; ETH +1% at $2,280; SOL -1% at $94; HYPE -3% at $86; ZEC even at $1,245

No notable alt movers

Oil -4% at $99; Gold +0.3% at $3,910

Stock futures are green as oil falls, tech rebounds; DOW +0.35%, Nasdaq +0.7%

The FBI and Secret Service opened probes into the $6.4 billion Binance hack, with the bureau confirming it is “working with public and private partners to assess its scope and coordinate investigative steps”

Binance set aside more than $6.34 billion in company funds to cover the stolen assets, about $5 billion of it already held in the same tokens that were taken; QCP reports $3.64B of net outflows since Binance reopened withdrawals

CFTC Chairman Michael Selig said the hack “proves our exact point” about the crypto market rules his agency proposed earlier this month

Elon Musk trolled Binance with a grimacing emoji on a post estimating $1 billion in losses, prompting CZ to reply “Elon, have a lot of respect for you, but bad time to troll. Please stop” and to point out that Binance’s SpaceX shares—acquired through its $500 million stake in the Twitter takeover—are now “worth more than a billion”

Issuer objections to tokenized share trading on OKXICE reached 50 companies, with Nvidia, Micron, Nike, Costco and Reddit among the latest to opt out; leaves just 12 of the 62 names the OKX-ICE joint venture originally planned to list

Corporate Treasuries & ETFs

The Bitcoin ETFs saw $643M in net outflows on Friday, flipping the month of October from +$127M to -$516M net; the ETH ETFs saw $156M in outflows and $1.61B in outflows on the month

Meme Coin Tracker

Meme leaders were slightly red; DOGE -1%, SHIB -2%, PEPE -2%, PENGU -3%, TRUMP +2%, SPX +1%, BONK -3%

Robinhood chain leaders were mixed; Pons -4% to $155M; Cashcat +7% at $100M; AI -5% at $62M; Orbio +20% and WTH +15% led top movers

Solana top movers included Anakin +120%, Gato +50%, and Choo +90%; Stonk -7% to $92M

💰 Token, Airdrop & Protocol Tracker

Pump.fun led onchain protocols in revenue on the day with $1.42M, followed by Hyperliquid at $1.23M and Collector Crypt at $315k

Crypto card issuer KAST said it will end Points earning on November 30 and replace the program with KAST Pioneer Units, a new loyalty credit for early users

🚚 What is happening in NFTs?