THORChain pauses swaps after reorg bug, slowing laundering of Binance-hack funds
THORChain halted swaps on ten networks after an Ethereum reorg exposed a refund flaw, and Cointelegraph says the pause also slowed Binance-hack funds.
- published on Newsmetry
- original source published
the same feed is available to bots and dashboards through the api. connect the api →
what happened
On Saturday, THORChain suspended swaps across several blockchains at 11:34 UTC. The stop followed a one-block reorganization on Ethereum that erased a 10 ETH deposit the protocol had already credited, according to THORChain's own account, as relayed by Cointelegraph.
When a swap missed its price limit, the system issued a refund for funds the vault never received, and the sender's real deposit was refunded too. That produced an extra 10 ETH payout and triggered an automatic pause. The team warned that any future chain reorg could let an attacker submit a transaction with the same nonce and collect funds from the vaults.
Ten networks were affected, Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana and Tron among them, while Avalanche, Base and XRP kept trading. Chainalysis said the halt also held up North Korean hackers trying to launder part of the $6.3 billion stolen in last week's Binance hack. Meanwhile the FBI asked node operators and DeFi services to block addresses linked to the TraderTraitor group.
why it matters
Pressure on THORChain over stolen funds is growing, and founder John-Paul Thorbjornsen argued that blocking transactions would undermine its permissionless model. For markets, the episode highlights risks in cross-chain bridges and reorgs, and rising pressure from US authorities on infrastructure providers.
market impact
Bitcoin, Ethereum: THORChain pause limits cross-chain transfers, including funds tied to the Binance hack
tags
instruments
sources
- THORChain halts swaps after block reorg bug, slowing Binance hackers — Cointelegraph, 2 November 2026 at 01:51 UTC
prepared by the newsmetry newsroom with ai assistance from the sources listed below. not investment advice.
alerts on your topics, the morning digest and the api — in your account.
get stories in real time ↗