Wall Street Firms Call Binance Hack a Buying Opportunity, Favor Bitcoin Proxies in Stock Market

Wall Street analysts are telling clients that the record-breaking hack of Binance — the largest cryptocurrency theft on record — is a buying opportunity rather than a reason to flee, urging them to pick up crypto-linked stocks while prices are depressed.

Analysts at Cantor Fitzgerald, TD Cowen, and Compass Point said in Friday research notes that the roughly $6.4 billion theft — a haul that dwarfs the previous record, the roughly $1.5 billion theft from exchange Bybit in February 2025 — is unlikely to derail the broader market's recovery. Their notes pushed back against the idea that the incident marks a systemic failure for the sector. The reassurance came a day after the exploit rattled markets and sent Bitcoin sliding toward $77,000.

Industry Moved Quickly to Contain the Damage

Cantor's Ramsey El-Assal pointed to how fast the industry moved to contain the fallout, noting that stablecoin issuers and others froze roughly $3 billion of the stolen funds. By his tally, Tether froze more than $1.5 billion, Circle about $800 million, and Ripple around $200 million.

El-Assal expects shares of Coinbase, Robinhood, and Strategy (formerly MicroStrategy, the largest corporate holder of Bitcoin) to recover once the panic fades. "We would be buyers on weakness," he wrote, adding that while the episode is painful, "this is not 2022." The remark pointed back to that year's cascade of exchange and lender failures — capped by the bankruptcy of FTX — which turned individual collapses into sector-wide contagion.

TD Cowen's Lance Vitanza struck a similar note, arguing that the breach exposed weaknesses in Binance's own security rather than in the underlying technology behind Bitcoin. He framed the selloff as a chance to add to Bitcoin and the stocks of public companies that hold it.

Compass Point's Ed Engel and Michael Donovan said Binance has "more than enough liquidity to cover the hole," while flagging that reimbursing customers could strain stablecoin supply and that rivals such as Coinbase and Hyperliquid could pick up business. They are watching the $75,000 to $77,000 Bitcoin range as a key level.

The Case for Stocks Over Tokens

The logic behind buying stocks over tokens, according to the analysts, is that regulated, exchange-listed proxies such as Coinbase, Robinhood, and Strategy offer crypto exposure without the custody risk the hack laid bare, and tend to rebound once sentiment steadies. In practice, that means exposure through listed equities rather than balances held directly in company-controlled exchange wallets.

Moody's Strikes a More Cautious Note

Not everyone is sanguine. Cristiano Ventricelli, vice president of digital assets at Moody's Ratings, said the incident "underscores the heightened cybersecurity risks associated with hot wallets" and "illustrates the risk concentration inherent in large, centralized intermediaries." Hot wallets are the internet-connected wallets exchanges keep funded to handle day-to-day withdrawals and trading, in contrast to offline cold storage.

He cautioned that the broader implications will hinge on "the ultimate losses, affected counterparties, asset recovery, and importantly, whether the incident leads to wider disruption or loss of confidence."

Company Response and Investigation

Binance has set aside $6.34 billion to cover losses and told users their assets are safe. The U.S. Secret Service and the FBI have opened a probe into the incident, and blockchain analytics firms including TRM and Chainalysis have tied the hack to North Korea's TraderTraitor group — the label U.S. agencies use for the country's crypto-focused hacking campaigns.

The analysts' calls were reported by Decrypt.