THE SAME ADDRESS SENT LIQUID’S RESERVE ANOTHER 50 BITCOIN — NOT A PEG-IN, NO L-BTC ISSUED — 52.53 BTC IN ABOUT 20 HOURS — THE GAP IS NOW 550.00004081
At bitcoin block 973,548, mined at 12:11 UTC (8:11 AM ET) on October 28, 2026, someone sent exactly 50 BTC to the Liquid Federation. It wasn’t a peg-in, and no L-BTC was issued for it. It came from bc1q3m7lnrqqs9489u64r60t9nr8dq5h7ajf3lasdj, the same address that sent the reserve 2.53048101 BTC at block 973,420 on October 27. After it, the liquid.network audit shows 3,702.34685023 BTC held against 4,252.34689104 L-BTC. The gap is 550.00004081 BTC.
The first deposit was sized to the satoshi. The gap read 602.53 BTC at every check we ran from October 11 to October 26, including our October 20 story, and the October 27 deposit took it to 600.00000000, fee included. It didn’t stay round. At block 973,527 the federation split 4 BTC of its own into ten smaller coins and paid a 4,081-sat fee. This time the deposit didn’t cover the fee: 600 plus 0.00004081, minus 50, is 550.00004081. Two new peg-ins, 1.25396442 and 2.09717413 BTC, added the same amount to both sides and didn’t move the gap.
Both deposits took the same road. At block 973,545, 33 minutes before the 50 BTC landed, a wallet Whale Alert labels Bitfinex sent 59.99994 BTC to that address. It passed 50 to the federation and 9.99993235 to a new address. On October 27 the same Bitfinex-labeled wallet funded the first deposit through the same address. An exchange withdrawal doesn’t tell you whose money it is, and Liquid hasn’t said. Its blog and Telegram channel had nothing newer than October 20 at 9:22 AM ET on October 28.
In about 20 hours, one sender has put in 52.53048101 BTC. Backing went from 85.88% to 87.07%. That still leaves 12.93% of L-BTC with no bitcoin behind it, and Liquid has said peg-outs come back only at full 1:1 backing. The attacker’s address still holds 598.50460993 BTC, unspent. Every number here checks out on public explorers. Who’s paying, and whether they’ll cover the last 550, you can’t check yet. At the time of this writing, bitcoin was $80,606.