Pain

“Do I have enough BNB left for gas?” is a good question to ask before confirming a swap on @PancakeSwap Now @TrustWallet lets you check without losing your place. Swipe down to minimize the dApp, check your balance, then tap the bar at the bottom to return to the swap. What I like about this change is how little it asks you to remember. The dApp is still there, in sight, while you use the rest of your wallet.

After years in this ecosystem, I’m tired of how quickly a problem at @binance becomes a reason to write the whole company off. My frustration is with the selective attention: the damage dominates the conversation, while the work to put things right gets far less recognition. So let’s include the response in the discussion. Following the October 29 breach, Binance committed to absorbing the financial impact rather than passing the stolen-fund losses on to users. What followed: • October 30: Binance announced more than 6.34B in company funds set aside, including 5B already held in the affected tokens. • The approximately 3B frozen during the response was excluded from that funding figure. Recovery remained pending. • According to Binance updates, replenishment rose from approximately 80% to 90%, reaching roughly 95% by November 1. • Withdrawals began reopening in phases on November 1. Those figures come from Binance own disclosures. They describe a substantial financial commitment and progress toward fulfilling it. There are people behind that response,too.@cz_binance publicly supported protecting users and said @heyibinance , who is pregnant, worked through the night alongside hundreds of Binancians. She, @_RichardTeng and the teams handling security, engineering, operations and customer support deserve recognition for the work involved. CZ also thanked industry partners and competitors who helped. That cooperation is worth highlighting. The breach was serious. Users deserve answers, and the remaining work matters. But scrutiny and writing a company off are different things. What I struggle with is the victory lap mentality. People waiting for their funds belong to the same crypto community, whichever exchange anyone prefers. Their uncertainty should never be something to celebrate. That’s why I defend Binance response: its commitment to bear the losses, the assets it reports having replaced, and the work to restore access. An honest assessment should give those actions their due.

The update I’m most glad to share today @binance has begun restoring withdrawals. For people who have been waiting to move their funds, this is a meaningful step forward. Withdrawals are returning in phases, with availability depending on the asset and network. Binance says each combination goes through security and readiness checks before reopening. Users should check the withdrawal page for their specific asset and network; processing may take longer during the rollout. Alongside that, Binance reports it has now replenished approximately 95% of the affected amount, up from 90% in its previous update. The remaining assets are less liquid and take longer to source. I’ve supported Binance commitment to absorb the financial impact of this incident. Seeing withdrawals begin to return gives that support another concrete foundation. The people handling security checks, rebuilding withdrawal services and answering customers have had a difficult job these past few days. Their work deserves recognition as users regain access. There is still work ahead, and I’m firmly behind the team carrying it through. Restoring access safely is progress worth acknowledging.

Yesterday I wrote about @binance committing resources to cover the incident. Today, there’s progress worth following up on. Binance says it has now replenished 90% of the affected amount. It reports full backing for BTC, ETH, USDT, BNB, SOL, USDC, XRP, USD1, RLUSD and ZEC. The remaining 10% involves less liquid tokens that the team is continuing to acquire through market and OTC channels. Replenished matters here: these are replacement assets being sourced to cover the loss. It doesn’t mean 90% of the stolen funds have been recovered from the attackers. I support Binance taking on that financial responsibility. Replacing the actual tokens owed to users is the work that gives its commitment substance. There’s progress on transparency too: a new reserves snapshot is available, with the complete cryptographic proof estimated for November 3. Withdrawals remain targeted to reopen on November 1. For the people waiting to access their funds, completing that work matters enormously. The teams handling security, sourcing assets and supporting users deserve recognition. Today’s update gives us a concrete reason to acknowledge their progress, and I’m backing their effort to see it through.

I stand with @binance and the teams working to protect its users through this incident. The commitment announced deserves recognition: more than 6.34 billion of company resources reserved to cover the incident, including 5 billion already held in the affected tokens, with the remainder being acquired. That figure excludes the roughly 3 billion frozen during the response. Those assets still need to be recovered. Binance’s announced coverage is therefore separate from that recovery effort. This is why I support the response. Putting company resources behind the commitment to protect customer balances is a substantial financial responsibility to take on. The incident is serious, and users understandably want answers. But the conversation should also give proper weight to what Binance is committing to do for them. I’ve spent a lot of time covering this ecosystem because I believe in what people are building here. That support extends to difficult days, when the work becomes protecting users, coordinating recovery and getting services back safely. My support goes to the teams doing that work. I want them to succeed, because the people who benefit from that success are the users themselves.

Some financial context: DefiLlama lists roughly 144B in Binance reserves. For scale, a 1B loss would equal about 0.69% of that figure. That is a hypothetical comparison, not a confirmed loss estimate or a measure of Binance own capital. The concrete positive development is Tether reporting more than 1.567B USDT frozen, alongside Binance statement that user funds are safe. I’m encouraged by that response. The next important step is a clear accounting of what was affected, what can be recovered, and how any remaining shortfall will be covered.

Thanks @McDonalds

Back in September, I shared BNB Hack Tokenized Stocks Edition. Today, we get to congratulate the builders who stood out. Moi, 4lpha, Redeye, TARE and Firstshare are the five winning projects, sharing $20,000 across the main prizes and special awards from @BNBCHAIN and Binance Web3 Wallet. One requirement deserves attention alongside the results: the Developer Experience Report accounted for 25% of the score. Builders were asked to document integration problems, confusing errors, latency, liquidity and how tokenized assets behaved outside traditional market hours. Anyone who has worked through an integration knows how much time can disappear into those details. Writing them down gives the teams maintaining the tools something concrete to improve. That’s a contribution worth recognizing too. Congratulations to the winners, and to everyone who put in the work to build, test and submit. I’m looking forward to seeing which ideas continue developing after the competition.