WazirX Exchange Hacked: $230 Million Stolen, Crypto Prices Plummet

WazirX Exchange Hacked: $230 Million Stolen, Crypto Prices Plummet

Early Thursday, a malicious attack targeted the Indian exchange WazirX, resulting in significant losses in market values for cryptocurrencies, including the platform’s native token. The hack drained roughly 50% of the exchange’s reserves, prompting WazirX to temporarily pause withdrawals.

Following the attack, WazirX’s WRX token has plummeted 15%, now trading at just over 14 cents, as per Coingecko data. The rupee-denominated price has seen an even steeper decline, falling more than 25% since the exchange confirmed the breach. The attacker made off with $230 million in customer funds, including $100 million in Shiba Inu (SHIB), $52 million in Ether (ETH), $11 million in MATIC, and $6 million in PEPE.

Since the incident, SHIB has depreciated by over 6% in U.S. dollar terms and has dropped 16% in rupee terms amid reports that the hacker is liquidating the stolen coins. Blockchain data indicates that the attacker is selling off SHIB, putting downward pressure on its market value.

Other tokens have remained relatively stable in dollar terms but have experienced significant losses in their INR pairs on the exchange.

Notably, the Bitcoin-rupee (BTC/INR) pair has decreased by 11% to 5.1 million rupees ($60,945), trading at a significant discount compared to prices on rival exchange CoinDCX, where Bitcoin is valued at 5.7 million rupees. Globally, BTC’s dollar-denominated price rose by 1% to $61,800 on the day, with the largest cryptocurrency by market value priced around $64,900 according to CoinDesk Indices data.

Additionally, the USDT-INR pair (USDT) on WazirX has slipped by 8%. The discounts in BTC, USDT, and other cryptocurrencies on WazirX likely reflect panic selling by investors and a rush to convert holdings to fiat/cash in response to the hack.