HTX marks $250m outflow post November hack

Massive outflows emerged from the crypto exchange following security breaches at three Justin Sun-affiliated platforms, including Heco Bridge and Poloniex.

Crypto users withdrew assets worth an estimated $258 million between Nov. 25, after HTX resumed operations, and Dec. 10, per DefiLlama data, indicating doubts regarding safety at the crypto exchange.

The net outflows occurred following a Nov. 22 hack on HTX, resulting in over $23 million siphoned from the platform formerly called Huobi. Heco bridge, a Sun-backed cross-chain protocol, was also exploited for around $85 million. The total losses suffered during the breach reached more than $100 million.

Before that, hackers stole $100 million in cryptocurrencies from Sun’s Poloniex exchange, and HTX lost $8 million to bad actors in September 2023, although the funds were later returned in October. The events amount to four separate hacks in three months with over $220 million in losses.

Sun responded by fielding a $10 million bounty if Poloniex’s hacker returned stolen funds while promising to fully reimburse affected users in the HTX and Heco bridge incidents. The founder of Tron’s blockchain announced an airdrop to this effect as crypto.news reported.

HTX ranked 17th among the top 20 centralized crypto exchanges and boasted an average daily trading volume of $1.6 billion at press time, per CoinMarketCap. Cryptocurrencies like HT, the platform’s exchange token, HBTC, Bitcoin (BTC), and staked Ether (stETH) formed the lion’s share of HTX’s reserves.

While these protocols experienced almost half a billion in combined net outflows and losses, Sun’s flagship digital asset endeavor reached a milestone of 200 million accounts on its blockchain, according to the crypto billionaire. Sun shared news of an airdrop to commensurate the landmark with free tokens of TRX, Tron’s native coin.