Bybit is no longer one of the top three centralized exchanges by trading volumes after the $1.4 billion Lazarus Group Hack led to a significant drop in market share. Bybit’s overall trading volume share has dropped by more than 50% since the hack, according to data from on-chain analytics platform Kaiko.
According to data from Kaiko, the market share of all major centralized exchanges for the past 30 days peaked at 32.04% on February 15th, with the exchange at 22.5% of the volume on February 20th, one day before the hack. However, as of March 9th, it had fallen to 9.04%, accounting for a decrease of approximately 60% over that period.
Exchange market share of Bitcoin volume (Source: Kaiko)
Bibit’s plunge is even more pronounced when examining offshore exchange trading volumes, that is, centralized exchanges that are not based on the US.
In this category, BYBIT was second to binance trading volumes before the February 21 hack. By March 9th, it had fallen to 10.57%.
Exchange Market Share (Source: Kaiko)
As a result, Bibit’s loss was Binance’s profit. The world’s largest exchange was the largest beneficiary of users’ exit book, as trading activity increased significantly after the buy-bit hack. It was clear how Binance’s market share increased significantly.
Before the hack, Binance was responsible for about 50% of the daily trading volume of centralized offshore exchanges. However, it changed significantly after hacking, with its market share increasing by an average of over 60%. Binance. The exchanges accounted for 70.5% of trading volume on February 23, 48 hours after the Buybit Hack.
Still, other exchanges had increased market share after the incident, even if they weren’t at similar speeds as Binance. The share of OKX and Coinbase’s trading volume has been relatively high since the incident.
Bibit showing signs of recovery
Meanwhile, Bybit’s current market share is a sign of a revival of trading activity, indicating that some users are returning. For days after the hack, market share fell free-falling, with Bybit’s overall share reaching 5.44% on March 2nd.
This highlights how the exchange’s crisis management can survive the biggest robbery of financial institutions. By choosing not to suspend withdrawals during the worst times of the crisis and continuing to update users, the exchange was able to maintain the most trust in the crypto community.
However, efforts to recover funds are very slow. Despite a multi-party effort involving several security experts, so far only about 3% of the funds have been frozen. Data on the Bybit Lazarusbounty page shows that only $43.71 million has been recovered so far.
The exchange also maintains the term “10% of all funds recovered as prize money.” So far, it has paid $4.32 million to several individuals and organizations who helped to freeze funds and provided information that led to the freeze.
Despite this effort, hackers were able to convert at least $300 million in stolen funds, according to Elliptic data.
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