Mercado Bitcoin Assures Users Won’t Lose Funds Following $38M Security Breach

The exchange has temporarily suspended deposits and withdrawals as a preventive measure to protect customer assets. Mercado Bitcoin stated services would resume only when full security conditions are met, emphasizing that no customer data had been compromised in the incident.

The security breach was first detected during the early hours of Monday when blockchain security firm Hypernative identified suspicious transfers. The firm reported that more than $40 million had moved out of wallets tied to Mercado Bitcoin across at least 10 blockchains.

Recovery Efforts

Mercado Bitcoin has already blocked $11 million in coordination with Tether, Circle, Paxos, BRL1, and Chainalysis. The exchange confirmed other amounts eligible for blocking have been identified, and containment efforts are continuing.

The exchange said services will resume only when full security conditions are met.

Suspicious Activity

The first suspicious transfer was recorded at 2:15 UTC, with the largest movements occurring between 6:19 and 6:53 UTC. During this period, wallets linked to the exchange sent funds to newly created addresses through ordinary signed transfers.

Meanwhile, ZachXBT flagged a separate suspected theft involving more than $133 million in withdrawals from centralized exchanges linked to an unnamed EU entity. The investigator believes a large financial institution in Western Europe may have been exploited and suspects the incident is being covered up.