Cryptocurrency exchange Bitget has confirmed a hack that drained more than $350 million in crypto assets from its wallets, according to CEO Gracy Chen. Chen said the company's cold wallets, those held offline, remain "fully secure," and that only the exchange's hot wallets, those connected for daily trading, were affected by the exploit.

On-chain data shows roughly $183 million in ETH, USDT, USDC, AVAX, BNB, and other tokens moved from wallets labeled as Bitget's to a single address over about an hour on Thursday. Users reported blocked withdrawals, and Bitget confirmed the hack following the publication of the initial report.

"User funds are safe. The full amount of this loss falls within the coverage of Bitget's User Protection Fund, which currently holds over $464 million," Chen posted on X.

In a security notice shared on X, Bitget said its security systems detected unauthorized transfers from some of its hot wallets at 18:31 UTC on September 24, 2026, and that the security team activated emergency response protocols immediately. The company has not publicly detailed how attackers gained access to the hot wallets, and no timeline has been given for when the withdrawals users reported as blocked would resume.

[SECURITY NOTICE] Bitget Hot Wallet Incident — September 24, 2026

At 18:31 UTC on September 24, 2026, Bitget's security systems detected unauthorized transfers from some of our hot wallets. Our security team activated emergency response protocols immediately. What we have…

— Gracy Chen @Bitget (@GracyBitget) September 24, 2026

On-Chain Sleuths Flag the Outflows

On-chain sleuths, including Bubblemaps and Arkham analysts, initially flagged the unusual activity late Thursday, describing Bitget—one of the world's larger centralized trading platforms—as "potentially hacked." Within about an hour, roughly $183 million in assets moved out of wallets labeled as belonging to the exchange and into a newly created address. According to Bubblemaps, the funds were sent across multiple chains to a single destination address beginning 0x770b, then further dispersed to additional addresses. Because blockchain transfers are publicly recorded, the funds' movements across those addresses remain visible to anyone tracking the incident.

$183M moved from Bitget wallets as recent as 24 minutes ago to the hacker's address 0x770b10b273fC44Fe9197D6bF20F145c2e98463Ee pic.twitter.com/eN5QXURmc3

— Emmett Gallic (@emmettgallic) September 24, 2026

The first sign came from a hot wallet—the internet-connected reserve an exchange uses to process everyday withdrawals quickly, as opposed to a cold wallet kept offline for safekeeping. A newly created address, beginning with "0xe410," took $19.67 million worth of USDT0—a cross-chain version of the dollar-pegged stablecoin Tether—and swapped the funds for 7,111 ETH in just six minutes. Unlike USDT, ETH is decentralized and hard to seize.

ALERT: 🚨 Bitget potentially hacked

Bitget wallets just sent $180M across multiple chains to a single destination: 0x770b10b273fC44Fe9197D6bF20F145c2e98463Ee

Which then further dispersed to: 0x469Ac1406dE92f82C05677240a3627057425DC… pic.twitter.com/1ydmKWAEAD

— Bubblemaps (@bubblemaps) September 24, 2026

Ether Bought at a Premium

Based on reports, the purchase ran through UniswapX and 1inch Fusion, services that let traders swap tokens directly on the blockchain without going through a middleman Whoever placed those orders paid roughly 5% above the going market rate—the kind of premium that shows up when speed matters more than getting a good price. It is a classic signal of a hacker trying to move quickly.

Think @bitget hot wallet might've just been hacked for 20M?

something hella fishy happening on @arbitrum

Fresh wallet 0xe410…d946 just bought 7,111 ETH on Arbitrum in 6 min with 19.67M USDT0 (from a Bitget hot wallet), via UniswapX + 1inch Fusion, paying up to +5% over spot…

— DCF GOD (@dcfgod) September 24, 2026

More transfers then followed. Additional wallets tagged as Bitget's sent ETH, AVAX, BNB, USDC, USDT, and XAUT—a token backed by physical gold—to the same address, according to pseudonymous on-chain researcher DCF GOD, who first flagged the activity on X.

Outflows from the exchange's publicly labeled wallets appeared to stop roughly six minutes after the first suspicious trade and stayed quiet for at least 20 minutes afterward, a pattern consistent with an exchange freezing withdrawals while it investigates.

Representatives for Bitget did not immediately respond to Decrypt's request for comment.

Custody Risk and a Growing Protection Fund

When you deposit money on an exchange like Bitget, you're trusting that company to guard it in wallets it controls, not so different from handing cash to a bank teller. The difference is there's no government deposit insurance waiting to make customers whole if that vault gets cracked—which is exactly why "not your keys, not your coins" became a crypto mantra in the first place.

This wouldn't be the first time that trust got tested. In 2023, Bitget touted a $300 million protection fund built specifically to cover hacks, theft, and similar losses. That fund has since grown: the company's CEO today confirmed it holds over $464 million—a sum exceeding the confirmed loss of more than $350 million—and will cover customer losses. How affected users would claim on that coverage has not yet been detailed.

The exchange has plenty of company. Rival exchange Bybit lost $1.4 billion in February 2025 after attackers spoofed a signing screen to hijack a routine cold-wallet transfer—the largest crypto theft on record. Across the industry last year, hackers stole a combined $2.72 billion from exchanges and protocols.

Editor's note: This story was updated after publication to include comment from Bitget CEO Gracy Chen confirming the hack.