Bitfinex Recovers Most Of Funds Taken in 2016 Hack
Recovered assets will be used right away to pay off people who own Recovery Right Tokens (RRT).
After being hacked in August 2016, Bitfinex was able to get back some of the money it lost.
After the security breach, the exchange’s creditors were given Recovery Right Tokens (RRTs), which will be used to pay the people who own them.
How Much Was Recovered?
The United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has returned $312,219.71 in cash and 6.917 Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Bitfinex said on Thursday. This money and Bitcoin Cash came from continued efforts to recover assets stolen in the hack.
“We are extremely pleased to be able to reach another successful milestone in the recovery of assets stolen from Bitfinex in 2016,” said Paolo Ardoino, Chief Technology Officer of Bitfinex.
The capture this month was done by U.S. Customs and Border Protection and will be used to pay back RRT holders. There are 30 million RRT tokens in circulation, and each one can be exchanged for $1. This means that the government still needs to find a lot more money to pay token users.
Still, CoinGecko says that the market price for these tokens jumped from $0.7 to $0.9 on Thursday before falling back to $0.75 at the time of writing. When people buy these tokens, they are essentially betting that Bitfinex will be able to recover assets, in which case they are sure to make money.
After paying all RRT holders, Bitfinex will use up to 80% of the rest of the recovered assets to pay holders of UNUS SED LEO, which is Bitfinex’s utility coin.
“Bitfinex continues to work with relevant law enforcement agencies and through the judicial system to recover property stolen from the exchange during the security breach,” wrote the exchange.
Bitfinex and the Biggest Financial Seizure Ever
The money still doesn’t come close to what was lost at the time, which was 119,756 BTC. At the time, that stash was worth just over $71 million. Now, it’s worth more than $3.6 billion.
Last year, when the couple thought to be behind the hack tried to move money between blockchain addresses, law enforcement caught them.
As a result, the DOJ was able to get back most of the related funds. This was the largest financial seizure in history, and it made the U.S. government the biggest single holder of BTC in the world.
In May, there were rumors that the government might sell thousands of Bitcoin that it had seized from Bitfinex and Silk Road. However, on-chain data showed that these stories were not true.
