Crypto Exchange AscendEX (Formerly Bitmax) Hacked: $80 Million Allegedly Stolen

AscendEX, a cryptocurrency exchange that recently celebrated its third anniversary, confirmed that numerous tokens were maliciously transferred out of its hot wallet earlier today. While the firm is yet to affirm the total amount stolen, early estimations show that the funds are worth roughly $80 million.

• The company admitted to detecting an undisclosed number of tokens based on Ethereum, Binance Smart Chain, and Polygon being transferred out of its hot wallet earlier on December 12th.
• It promised that it had begun an investigation and that the cold wallets were not affected. Moreover, AscendEX said all users that had their funds drained will be “covered completely” by the exchange.
• The trading platform didn’t provide specifics on which tokens were maliciously withdrawn or what’s their USD value.
• However, the blockchain security and data analytics resource PeckShield outlined the estimations later on.
• The firm noted that the total loss is roughly $78 million, with $60 million on Ethereum, $9.2 million on BSC, and $8.5 million on Polygon. PeckShield also provided a list of the transferred-out tokens.

Estimated loss @AscendEX_Global: $77.7M in total ($60M on @ethereum $9.2M @BinanceChain $8.5M @0xPolygon). Here is the list of the transferred-out assets and their amounts on @ethereum pic.twitter.com/VC4DKOwu4f

— PeckShield Inc. (@peckshield) December 12, 2021

• This is the second high-end hack against a centralized cryptocurrency exchange since the start of December.
• CryptoPotato reported last week that Bitmart also fell victim to a security breach with up to $200 million being swiped in various cryptocurrencies. The trading venue had temporarily suspended withdrawals, which it resumed days later, and also promised to reimburse users from its own funds.