Key Insights: Changpeng Zhao (CZ) urges Elon Musk to stop trolling Binance after its reported $6.3 billion hack. Zhao cited SpaceX holdings worth over $1 billion while explaining Binance’s lo
Binance hack fallout prompted co-founder Changpeng Zhao (CZ) to confront Elon Musk publicly as the exchange reported a $6.3 billion breach. Changpeng Zhao called it a “bad time to troll” and asked Musk to stop. His response followed Elon Musk’s jokes about the attack and drew attention to Binance’s resources for covering the losses.
The dispute began following a warning from Changpeng Zhao against suspicious email links and attachments, even from apparently trusted contacts.
Changpeng Zhao Fires Back at Elon Musk After Binance Hack | Source: X
Musk replied with fire and laughing emojis before Binance disclosed the breach the next day. After reports emerged, he commented, “Everyday is Zeroday” on a post discussing the stolen cryptocurrency.
The remark referred to security weaknesses that attackers exploit before developers can fix them. When his warning resurfaced, Changpeng Zhao said he wished more people had followed it. However, he described the Binance hack as more complex and said compromised devices or algorithms often feature in security incidents.
Musk later posted a grimacing emoji during another exchange involving Zhao. CZ then requested support and cited Binance’s contribution to Musk’s Twitter takeover. He claimed SpaceX holdings associated with that $500 million contribution in 2022 were worth more than $1 billion.
The reference to Changpeng Zhao regarding SpaceX prompted a user to question how the shares related to Binance’s security problems. Zhao explained that he was identifying assets available when assessing the financial damage. However, he did not announce plans to sell the shares.
His calculation placed the impact above $6 billion and frozen assets at about $3 billion. He also cited more than $1 billion through Binance’s Secure Asset Fund for Users, known as SAFU.
That left an estimated $2 billion gap, which CZ described as manageable but painful. The calculation did not establish a final accounting of recoverable assets.
Separately, analyst 0xngmi estimated losses near $1 billion after stablecoin freezes, citing Binance’s claimed $144 billion in custody. Zhao replied that losses might be higher but said the company would cover them.
Alongside those estimates, Binance expanded its initial explanation of the attack, which centered on a DevOps engineer’s compromised laptop. The exchange initially said an attacker may have accessed a service container and pushed through unauthorized withdrawals.
However, Binance later reported additional breach points. In addition to the Changpeng Zhao Binance news, CEO Richard Teng disclosed that the attacker did not simply use one engineer’s permissions.
He also said the breach was not a single “one-click” action. Binance said investigators found no evidence of a wallet private key leak. The company said it had not assigned responsibility to any individual.
Meanwhile, Binance said it was working with law enforcement, Tether, Circle and industry partners to freeze further assets. It pledged to cover all losses using SAFU and company reserves.
The exchange said customers would bear no financial impact from the losses. Its $6.3 billion estimate exceeded the 2025 Bybit hack’s losses by more than four times.
Against that backdrop, Quinten Francois said markets had fallen only 2% to 3% despite the record Binance hack. He argued that Binance’s resources would prevent the bankruptcies and wider losses associated with FTX’s collapse.
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