The exchange says company funds already cover most losses, with SAFU set to fill the remaining gap before withdrawals resume
Binance expects to partially deploy its Secure Asset Fund for Users, better known as SAFU, within the next 24 hours. The move follows a security breach that drained approximately $6.3 billion in crypto from the exchange’s hot wallets.
The announcement came on October 31, 2026. The breach itself occurred two days earlier, on October 29, and involved unauthorized withdrawals from the exchange’s internet-connected wallets.
How Binance plans to cover the hole
The headline number is large, but Binance says it is not starting from zero. The exchange has reserved over $6.34 billion in company funds to address the losses.
Of that amount, $5 billion is held in the specific tokens affected by the incident. That detail matters more than it might seem.
When an exchange loses Bitcoin, it owes users Bitcoin, not a dollar-equivalent IOU. Holding the exact assets that were stolen means Binance can restore balances without scrambling to buy everything at once.
According to the exchange, those reserved funds allow for about 90% coverage of the losses. The partial SAFU deployment is meant to close the remaining 10% gap.
To get there, Binance plans to acquire the outstanding tokens through a mix of market transactions and over-the-counter channels. The goal is full backing for every affected asset, including BTC, ETH and USDT, among others.
Binance has also committed to absorbing all losses itself rather than passing them on to users.
Withdrawals frozen, for now
Withdrawals on Binance remain suspended. The exchange anticipates resuming them on November 1, 2026, once the SAFU deployment is complete.
A fund built for a rainy day
SAFU was established in July 2018 as a safety net funded by the exchange. It has stepped in before, including fully reimbursing users after a 2019 hack.
Earlier in 2026, Binance converted its SAFU holdings entirely into Bitcoin. Recent evaluations put the fund at around 15,000 BTC, valued at approximately $1.17 billion at a price of $77,700 per BTC.
The fund has been managed by Nest Clearing and Custody Limited, in compliance with Abu Dhabi Global Market regulations. That structure is meant to keep the reserves separate and subject to regulatory oversight.
After the partial deployment, Binance plans to replenish SAFU to approximately $1 billion.
What this means for users and the wider market
The scale of the incident also changes how SAFU itself should be understood. A fund of roughly $1.17 billion cannot cover a $6.3 billion loss on its own.
What actually carried the load here was Binance’s corporate balance sheet. SAFU played the role of the finishing piece, not the foundation.
Because SAFU is held entirely in BTC, the dollar value of Binance’s emergency cushion moves with the market.
The things to watch are concrete. First, whether the partial SAFU deployment lands within the promised 24-hour window. Second, whether withdrawals actually resume on November 1 as anticipated. Third, how quickly Binance follows through on rebuilding SAFU to approximately $1 billion.
