Bitcoin price dropped below $80,000 on October 30 following a major security breach at Binance and a wave of forced liquidations in leveraged positions. BTC traded near $78,420, representing a roughly 2% decline over 24 hours and a brief dip below $77,000 before partial recovery.
The sell-off coincided with approximately 239,000 traders facing liquidations, according to CoinGlass data. Total liquidations reached $1.54 billion, with long positions accounting for around $1.3 billion of that figure. The largest individual liquidation was an $11.09 million BTC/USDT position on Binance.
Binance Breach and Response
Binance disclosed a security incident with an estimated impact of approximately $6.3 billion. The exchange said it had coordinated with blockchain partners to freeze roughly $3 billion in affected assets on-chain.
The preliminary investigation identified a compromised DevOps engineer's laptop as the breach's entry point. According to Binance, the attacker may have used that access to enter a service container and submit unauthorized withdrawal transactions. The exchange reported finding no evidence of leaked wallet private keys, with a detailed technical account expected following a complete investigation.
Binance pledged to cover losses through its SAFU emergency fund and company resources, with an updated proof-of-reserves report to follow remediation efforts.
Additional Market Pressures
Bitcoin's decline followed separate headwinds from the Federal Reserve's October 28 decision to maintain its benchmark interest rate at 3.75%–4%, with two officials supporting a quarter-point increase. The rate decision and exchange breach presented distinct market pressures related to monetary policy and exchange security concerns.
Institutional Fund Flows
US spot Bitcoin ETFs recorded $17.07 million in net inflows on October 29, extending a positive streak to four consecutive trading sessions. The previous three sessions had attracted approximately $423.66 million combined, following earlier outflows of about $773.5 million on October 22 and 23.
