Binance, one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges, reported that its Ethereum (ETH) perpetual futures funding rate remained in negative territory near -0.011% on October 31. Despite this, a significant share of futures accounts on the exchange continued to hold long positions, even as Binance worked to replace most assets affected by its recent security breach.
Binance Futures Positioning and ETH Funding Trends
QuantM Intel stated that approximately 73.4% of Binance futures accounts maintained long positions at the time of the snapshot. During this period, Ethereum traded around $2,242. Traders holding short positions continued to pay funding to those holding longs, reflecting ongoing negative funding rates.
The current situation follows Binance’s announcement that it had replenished 90% of affected crypto assets after the security incident. The company highlighted plans to reopen withdrawals by November 1 as efforts to restore remaining tokens continue.
Negative funding rates in Binance’s ETH perpetual contracts indicated shorts still covered payments to longs, standing at -0.011% per eight hours in the morning session on October 31. This figure was a slight improvement from the earlier -0.0136% noted at midnight UTC, signaling modest shifts but persistent imbalance.
QuantM Intel clarified that its 73.4% statistic represented the overall long-account share across Binance futures, without specifying just Ethereum positions. Such ratios reflect investor sentiment, but a prevalence of long accounts can exist alongside negative funding, deriving from ongoing market dynamics and funding rate structures.
CoinGlass reported Ethereum’s open-interest-weighted funding at -0.0053%, with the volume-weighted figure at -0.0061%. For comparison, Bitcoin’s corresponding funding rates were positive, at +0.0104% and +0.0095%. This difference pointed to stronger bullish sentiment in Bitcoin perpetual futures markets relative to Ethereum. Funding rates can provide insight but do not guarantee future price direction.
| Asset | Open-Interest-Weighted Funding | Volume-Weighted Funding |
|---|---|---|
| Ethereum | -0.0053% | -0.0061% |
| Bitcoin | +0.0104% | +0.0095% |
Security Incident and Asset Replenishment
Binance confirmed that it had replenished 90% of the assets affected by the breach, raising the recovery from its previous update of 80%. The exchange previously allocated more than $6.34 billion from company funds to address the losses, assuring users that customer balances would not be impacted.
Binance stated its primary reserves now fully back ten major coins, including BTC, ETH, USDT, BNB, SOL, USDC, XRP, USD1, RLUSD, and ZEC, while the remaining tokens with lower liquidity still require market purchases for full replacement.
The additional funding for affected tokens is being sourced from Binance’s corporate reserves, its SAFU emergency insurance fund, and part of its Futures insurance reserves. Solid Intel also noted that Binance published an updated Proof of Reserves snapshot on October 31 and scheduled full verification checks by November 3. The exchange plans to restore its SAFU fund to approximately $1 billion.
Mini dictionary: SAFU (Secure Asset Fund for Users) is an emergency insurance fund launched by Binance in 2018, designed to protect user assets in extreme situations, such as security breaches or significant losses.
Market Liquidations and Upcoming Restorations
According to CoinGlass, total liquidations across the crypto market in the past 24 hours amounted to about $187.87 million. Of this, $143.91 million were long positions and $43.96 million were shorts, with around 63,582 traders affected. Long liquidations represented 76.6% of the total value.
Binance accounted for 51.5% of the tracked liquidation volume, including the single largest order valued at $4.66 million in a BTCUSDT position. In a four-hour window, total liquidations reached $8.60 million, split between $3.15 million in longs and $5.45 million in shorts. These statistics covered the broader crypto market, not just ETH.
The exchange reaffirmed its plan to restore withdrawals by November 1 and stated that existing insurance reserves continued to meet requirements. Binance is committed to purchasing and replacing outstanding affected tokens until losses from the breach are entirely resolved. For Ethereum traders, perpetual funding rates and liquidation trends stand out as primary indicators for monitoring leverage and sentiment as withdrawals resume.
Even with most user assets replenished, Binance emphasized that it will continue acquiring the remaining tokens in the market and over the counter, aiming to fully restore balances after the security incident.
