Tether has frozen more than 4.5 million USDT linked to the security incident at Brazilian exchange Mercado Bitcoin, chief executive Paolo Ardoino said on November 2. His announcement directly quoted the exchange’s official incident notice.
Tether froze more than 4.5M USDT related to this security incident.
— Paolo Ardoino (@paoloardoino) November 2, 2026
Ardoino’s statement gives a lower bound rather than an exact total. It does not identify the blockchain or wallet addresses involved in Tether’s action, name a cooperating law-enforcement agency or announce that the frozen tokens have been returned.
Mercado Bitcoin reported that it had quickly contained an incident in one of its systems. The company said customers had suffered no losses and no data had leaked, while deposits and withdrawals were temporarily suspended as a precaution.
In a separate tracing update, the exchange published destination addresses for EVM networks, Bitcoin, Solana, Stellar and Tron. It said teams were working to restore operations safely, but provided no reopening deadline in that statement.
CoinScreamer’s earlier report covered researchers’ preliminary estimate of more than $40 million in suspicious transfers. That remains distinct from an exchange-confirmed loss figure. Tether’s freeze restricts the identified USDT, but does not establish recovery of the full amount involved in the incident.
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