Crypto Weekly: Binance Hack Deepens Crypto Rout as Market Cap Falls to $2.7T

Pre-Hack Weakness

The cryptocurrency economy shed tens of billions of dollars in the final week of October, ending the month down 10% from its opening market capitalization of $3 trillion. The decline was particularly unusual given October’s historical reputation as a strong month for cryptocurrencies, including bitcoin.

According to seven-day data from Coingecko, bitcoin, which came close to reclaiming its year-opening price on Oct. 6, ended the final week of the month down 3.3%. The decline pushed the cryptocurrency’s year-to-date losses to 11%, effectively reversing an upward trend that began in August.

While a sell-off triggered by the Binance hack pushed bitcoin to nearly two-month lows, the cryptocurrency was already struggling. Prior to the breach, bitcoin had dropped over 7% after failing to clear the $87,000 resistance level in the first week of the month. As reported by Bitcoin.com News, this was bitcoin’s weakest October performance since 2014 and its first back-to-back October loss since 2011–2012, sparking concerns over its November outlook.

October was equally challenging for altcoins, with ether ($ETH), the second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, suffering even steeper losses. Like bitcoin, $ETH rallied during the first week of October as the broader cryptocurrency market appeared to sustain September’s momentum. However, after briefly surpassing $2,700, $ETH began a steady decline, falling to $2,300 by Oct. 29.

The sell-off following the Binance hack pushed $ETH below $2,190 before a relief rally lifted it back above $2,200. Consequently, $ETH ended the week down nearly 4%, extending its 30-day losses to more than 15%.

Other major altcoins, including solana (SOL) and cardano (ADA), suffered even steeper weekly declines, falling 7% and 6.6%, respectively. Many other altcoins recorded seven-day losses ranging from 3% to 4%.

Despite the broader downturn, a handful of altcoins managed to post weekly gains. Hyperliquid’s HYPE token, which came close to surpassing its all-time high on Oct. 29, ended the week up 13.6%, while zcash (ZEC) gained 0.6%. LEO, QNT and UNI also posted gains of 4.6%, 2.5% and 2.3%, respectively.

However, losses across bitcoin and numerous large-cap altcoins weighed heavily on the broader market, dragging the cryptocurrency economy’s total market capitalization from $2.8 trillion on Oct. 25 to $2.7 trillion by Nov. 1.