Bitcoin Holds Up After $6.3B Binance Hack, Strive CEO Says

Bitcoin held up better than expected after the reported $6.3 billion Binance hack, trading near $77,400 at 4 p.m. Saturday—about 4% below its level shortly before the attack began Thursday, according to CoinGecko data. Strive CEO Matt Cole said the breach, which affected Binance wallets rather than the Bitcoin network, has not changed the company’s long-term investment thesis for BTC.

Speaking on Cointelegraph’s Chain Reaction, Cole compared the incident to a bank robbery rather than a failure of Bitcoin’s underlying infrastructure. Strive, a publicly traded company holding Bitcoin on its balance sheet, reported owning 43,000 BTC as of Oct. 23. Cole said Bitcoin’s decline was less severe than he anticipated given the scale of the breach and broader market weakness, although he cautioned that it was too early to identify a market bottom.

According to Glassnode, Thursday’s breach was the largest cryptocurrency hack on record, affecting roughly $6.3 billion—more than the combined losses from the next nine largest exploits. It surpassed the $1.5 billion Bybit hack from February 2025. Glassnode also noted that three of the 10 largest crypto hacks since the beginning of 2025 have involved exchanges.

Paul Chapman, financial crime director at Wirex, emphasized that Bitcoin itself had not been hacked. Following the Bybit breach, Bitcoin fell roughly 5%, from nearly $100,000 to around $95,000, while Anchorage Digital data cited by CNBC showed an average decline of 8.3% during the first 24 hours after previous exchange exploits. Cole characterized the current recovery as an “early spring” phase that could last another six to nine months, with prices potentially rising gradually rather than immediately reaching new highs.