Bitget CEO ‘not very optimistic’ on recovering funds from $388M breach
Gracy Chen said she saw the 2025 Bybit hack as a “good reference point” for Bitget’s security breach, noting that only a small percentage of funds had been frozen or recovered.
The CEO of crypto exchange Bitget isn’t sure that the company can fully freeze or recover all the assets compromised in a security breach last week that resulted in the loss of $388 million in crypto.
Speaking on Cointelegraph’s Chain Reaction released Tuesday, Bitget CEO Gracy Chen said she was looking at the February 2025 hack of crypto exchange Bybit as a “good reference point” for Thursday’s breach. Hackers stole about $1.5 billion worth of Ether (ETH) from Bybit, and the company reported only freezing and recovering a combined $80 million.
“I’m actually not very optimistic because after a year or so of Bybit’s hack, they’ve only [been able to freeze] about 3.5% of the total stolen funds,” said Chen. “That’s only the freezing. It’s not about recovery yet.”
Bitget CEO Gracy Chen (left) speaking to Cointelegraph’s Ciaran Lyons (right). Source: Cointelegraph
Bitget launched a bounty program in response to the incident, offering 5% of funds frozen and 5% for those recovered. Some companies have already stepped up to try to mitigate user losses.
The team behind NEAR Intents reported on Monday that it had blocked more than $50 million in assets tied to the attack and froze about $500,000. Chen also confirmed that stablecoin issuers Tether and Circle blacklisted a wallet linked to the exploit, freezing $318,013 in USDt (USDT) and USDC (USDC).
The security breach is one of the largest to impact the crypto industry in 2026, following a $320 million exploit of the Liquid Network in September. Among the most significant attacks are Bybit’s in 2025, a $615 million Ronin Bridge hack in 2022 and a $611 million hack of the Poly Network in 2021.