Source time Edition date
ProtocolsChainalysis
Disrupting the Mercado Bitcoin Attack: How Chainalysis Led the Freeze of Nearly $10M in Stolen Funds
阻止Mercado Bitcoin攻击：Chainalysis如何主导冻结近1000万美元被盗资金
Chainalysis freezing nearly $10M tied to the Mercado Bitcoin exploit shows how much recovery now depends on blockchain-analytics firms deciding fast whether to intervene.
Judgment
Stablecoin issuers and law enforcement now face a faster freeze-or-hold call: Chainalysis’s triage made Mercado Bitcoin a time-limited race, because the first hours decide whether centrally issued stablecoins can be frozen before attackers convert them to BTC/ETH.
Basis
Chainalysis’s account says Mercado Bitcoin alerted it early on Nov. 2 after an attacker moved assets across 17 blockchains and stole an estimated $49 million. Chainalysis says it mobilised investigators from three continents, set priorities to identify/trace/label stolen assets, find intervention opportunities, and coordinate with law enforcement and stablecoin issuers. The mechanism is speed: the first hours matter because centrally issued stablecoins can be frozen before attackers convert them into harder-to-disrupt BTC and ETH. At 2:30 am Eastern Time a Mercado Bitcoin director phoned its in-country solutions expert; within 30 minutes Chainalysis contacted law enforcement with freezable addresses; by morning it had helped lock down $4 million in stolen stablecoins, and the total freeze reached nearly $10 million. It says it communicated with Paxos, Anchorage Digital, Ripple, Circle, and Tether. Largest tranches were Bitcoin and Ethereum, with assets also swept on Base, Tron, and Polygon.
- Stolen fundsapproximately $49 million
- Frozennearly $10 million
- Stablecoins locked by morning$4 million
- Blockchains involved17
Unclear The source does not say how much of the stolen $49 million remains unfrozen or whether any stablecoin issuer declined a freeze request.
Next Watch for a follow-up Chainalysis, Mercado Bitcoin, or law-enforcement statement naming the frozen addresses and updating the total beyond “nearly $10 million.”