About 280 million XRP entered Binance in just 48 hours, marking a sudden increase in the exchange’s holdings following the Oct. 29 security breach.
Between Nov. 3 and 5, the world’s largest crypto exchange saw its XRP reserves rise from 2.35 billion to 2.63 billion tokens, an increase of 11.9%.
The increase comes one week after hackers broke into five of Binance’s hot wallets and stole billions of dollars’ worth of crypto assets.
The Binance Hack
The latest increase in Binance’s XRP reserves follows the Oct. 29 attack, when hackers stole 233.46 million XRP from five of the exchange’s hot wallets in a coordinated operation. Blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs later linked the attack to North Korea’s TraderTraitor hacking group.
XRP was not the only cryptocurrency affected. The hackers also stole 18,270 Bitcoin, 970,500 Solana, and 44.2 million OP tokens. These losses brought the estimated value of the stolen assets to roughly $6.34 billion, making the incident the largest cryptocurrency heist on record.
Meanwhile, large-transfer netflows on Binance moved from an outflow of 226 million XRP on Oct. 29 to an inflow of 273 million XRP by Nov. 4. This represents a reversal of roughly 500 million XRP in net movement in less than a week.
Binance Covers the Tab
Binance assured customers that they would not suffer any losses from the attack. The exchange used its own funds to cover the stolen assets, drawing from three sources: its Secure Asset Fund for Users (SAFU), futures insurance reserves, and corporate holdings.
Binance also froze or intercepted approximately $2.85 billion in assets linked to the attack. Separately, industry partners Tether and Circle froze about $3 billion in affected assets.
By Nov. 4, Binance had replaced 98% of the affected assets. XRP was among the fastest tokens to recover, as the exchange restored 100% reserve backing for it by October 31, just two days after the breach.
Nine other cryptocurrencies also reached full reserve backing during the same period. These included Bitcoin, Tether’s USDT, Ripple’s RLUSD, Ethereum, Solana, BNB, Solana, USD1, USDC, and Zcash. Binance confirmed these figures through its Proof of Reserves system.
XRP Deposits Spike on Binance
The 280 million XRP increase also comes as deposit and withdrawal activity on Binance changes. Data shows that the exchange’s share of XRP deposit transactions across centralized exchanges rose from 44.3% on Oct. 27 to 56.2% on Nov. 5.
At the same time, Binance’s share of XRP withdrawal transactions fell from 55.7% to 43.7%. This means deposits now account for a larger share of XRP transaction activity on the platform than withdrawals.
The broader centralized exchange market recorded a smaller change. Across all CEX platforms, the share of XRP deposit transactions increased from 45% to 47.5%, while the withdrawal share declined from 55% to 52.4%.
Withdrawals still accounted for the larger share of transactions across the industry, although the gap between deposits and withdrawals became smaller.
Data from other major exchanges shows a different trend. Upbit, South Korea’s largest crypto exchange, saw its XRP reserves decline from 6.44 billion to 6.41 billion between Oct. 30 and Nov. 5.
Bithumb also recorded a drop in its holdings. Its XRP reserves fell from 1.85 billion to 1.81 billion since October 23.
Where Did the 280M XRP Come From?
Binance has also taken steps to provide more information about its reserves. On Nov. 4, the exchange released an updated Proof of Reserves snapshot, expanding the number of verified assets from 10 to 44.
However, the exchange has reported different figures for its asset recovery at different times. Binance reported 90% replenishment on Oct. 31, increased that figure to 95% on Nov. 2, and later reported 98%.
Despite these updates, one important question remains: where did the additional 280 million XRP that entered Binance’s reserves between Nov. 3 and 5 come from?
The tokens could have come from open-market purchases, over-the-counter (OTC) deals, or transfers between Binance’s internal wallets. However, the exchange has not confirmed which of these explains the increase. As a result, the source of the additional XRP remains unknown.