Mercado Bitcoin is the latest digital asset company to suffer a hack, Bloomberg reported Monday (Nov. 2).
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The Brazilian cryptocurrency broker will absorb a $40 million loss from the incident, the report said. No customer losses are expected.
The attack targeted “hot wallets” but was quickly contained, according to the report. Mercado Bitcoin is investigating the incident, following the assets and working with authorities and relevant partners. No customer data was leaked, although the company temporarily suspended access to its app as a precaution.
This breach came days after Binance, the world’s largest crypto exchange, was the victim of a crypto heist in which hackers stole a record $6.3 billion. Net customer withdrawals were approaching $5 billion as of Monday morning, the report said.
Binance said it intends to cover the losses in full, PYMNTS reported Friday (Oct. 30).
“That commitment places the immediate financial burden on the exchange rather than making customers wait for investigators to recover the proceeds,” PYMNTS reported separately Friday.
Sandeep Pyapali, founder and CEO of stablecoin infrastructure company Mesta, outlined for PYMNTS the conditions for making good on that promise.
“User balances are only truly safe if the exchange replaces the missing assets quickly, reopens withdrawals in an orderly way and proves its reserves again,” Pyapali said.
Recovery takes different routes depending on the theft. Tether and Circle froze about $3 billion after the Binance hack.
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