Massive outflows of $5.7 billion from Binance triggered intense suspicion of a potential “drain” - initially appearing to be institutional capital movement or heavy trading activity rather than an exploit - but eventually confirmed as a hack. Stablecoin issuers moved aggressively to freeze the relevant funds. Tether and Circle blacklisted and froze almost $1 billion each in USDT and USDC. Binance founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao publicly stated that “it does look like a hack” but that “user funds are safe”. CZ added that while he “no longer manages” following his obligatory regulatory step-down, he expects all user funds to be fully covered in his “capacity as a major shareholder.” Well, at least now one knows who is (still) really in charge at Binance …