Over $ 623 million worth of Bitcoin stolen Bitfinex in 2016 was moved on Wednesday the same day as Coinbase’s direct listing on Nasdaq
Surely everyone remembers the 119,756 Bitcoin hack on Bitfinex in 2016. And recently, 10% of that huge amount of BTC was transferred on Wednesday to the same day the market celebrated an important milestone in crypto history: Coinbase’s direct listing on Nasdaq.
Source: Whale Alert
$ 623 million in Bitcoin from 2016 Bitfinex hack moved under cover of Coinbase (COIN) hype
It is known that 10% of the total 119,756 BTC stolen from Bitfinex in the 2016 hack were moved. This happened when Coinbase was listed directly on the Nasdaq – this was not really a random moment.
Nick Mancini, research analyst at Trade the Chain, said:
“We believe that the BTC transfers started during the trading for Coinbase’s direct listing. The media shields allow them to at least get less publicity, considering there are fewer people tracking their movements or reporting it … everyone’s focused on the Coinbase listing.”
More than 5,000 BTC were also transferred on November 30 from the same stolen fund. The move-in November of the funds took place as the price of Bitcoin headed towards $ 20,000, a record high at the time.
But some argue that this move is not likely to pose any short-term risks to Bitcoin.
People commenting below “why don’t they use X” fail to realize this 1 tx of many, we’re talking billions of dollars of BTC. Cash out services, even on chain, either have kyc, gov blocking, or can’t handle the volume. Otherwise the hacker would have done it in the past 5 years.
— Adam Cochran (@adamscochran) April 14, 2021
Mancini said:
“Although it is time-consuming, difficult, and somewhat trackable, we have seen with the wallets of where the money was transferred, they are already trying to obfuscate everything as best as possible. I suspect that this is not the final destination for these coins but the first destination for a path of many ways that these bad actors will take to eventually extract value out of the Bitcoin.”
However, with the proliferation of decentralized exchanges, Mancini said that there could be ways for the bad guys from the hack to steal Bitcoin’s address to be stolen through popular fundraising methods such as Initial DEX offerings (IDOs).
You can see the BTC price here.
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