Binance co-CEO says company is in very strong financial health after $6.3 billion heist

By Summer Zhen, Selena Li and Yantoultra Ngui

HONG KONG, Nov 3 (Reuters) - Binance co-CEO Richard Teng said on Tuesday the exchange is in "very strong financial health" and that a "post-mortem" of last week’s $6.3 billion cyber heist will be released in due course.

Speaking at a Hong Kong Fintech Week event, Teng said hourly inflows and outflows had "pretty much normalised" and that 95% of the affected tokens had been replenished after the exchange was hit with what could be the largest-ever financial heist. 

Teng said the losses were covered by the Secure Asset Fund for Users (SAFU) emergency reserve, and by other company funds, which had been set aside. He added the remaining 5% of affected tokens are less liquid tokens, and Binance is working with over-the-counter providers to restore them.

"It’s a painful lesson. We take responsibility for it," he said. "We will come out stronger, user funds are safe on that front, and we will continue to grow from strength to strength."

Customers had withdrawn a net $4.72 billion as of Monday, Binance said earlier. That is about 3% of assets on the platform, a relatively modest figure that analysts said suggested customer confidence had largely held up. Most withdrawals were in Tether’s USDT stablecoin, Binance added.

"The company is in very strong financial health," Teng said. "This is something that we can cover. We are able to do so."

The FBI said at the weekend that North Korea was responsible for the theft of more than $6 billion in crypto assets, a crime that sent shockwaves through the industry. North Korea rejected the allegations as "absurd rhetoric".

Most of the heist unfolded in about 20 minutes, blockchain records showed, beginning shortly after 2000 GMT on Thursday.

Binance said it has more than 335 million users worldwide and average daily trading volumes of $95 billion across digital assets and derivatives.