NEAR Protocol and the Binance hack: 11.8 million stolen NEAR are lying dormant

NEAR Protocol has fallen 7.3 percent in 24 hours to $3.34, or roughly €3.03 (as of November 14, 2026, 14:50, data from CoinGecko). What is documented: according to an Elliptic analysis dated November 9, around 11.8 million NEAR from the Binance hack are still sitting untouched in the attackers' wallets, and 117,000 NEAR have already been laundered through six purpose-built throwaway tokens. Our assessment follows further down: today's drop is mainly part of the broad market sell-off, but the dormant stash is a risk that NEAR holders should be aware of.

For you as an investor, this means two things. The price is as low as it was in mid-September, and a pile of stolen coins hangs over the market, coins whose owners can sell or move them at any moment. This article shows how large that stash is in proportion and what to keep an eye on now when buying, storing and paying tax.

NEAR price at $3.34: lowest daily level since September 18

According to CoinGecko, the 24-hour high was $3.59 and the low $3.30. Over seven days NEAR is down 9.6 percent, over 30 days 27.0 percent. Market capitalisation falls to around $4.38 billion, which puts NEAR at number 22 among the largest cryptocurrencies.

The daily values of the past 90 days put the level in context. The last time NEAR traded lower than today was on September 18, 2026, at around $3.15. Before that, in mid-September, it had even stood at just over $2.30, until the autumn rally lifted the price sharply into October. The token is now 83.7 percent below its all-time high of $20.44 from January 2022.

What the daily close says about the trend

A daily close is the last price of a trading day, which in crypto is usually measured at midnight UTC. It is considered more robust than a brief intraday low because individual downward spikes do not show up in it. Since November 9, NEAR's daily close has ranged between $3.42 and $3.62. If it now falls below $3.34, the token will have broken out of last week's range to the downside.

Elliptic analysis: 11.8 million NEAR from the Binance hack are still dormant

Elliptic is a London-based blockchain analytics company that tracks payment flows on public blockchains and supplies its findings to authorities and exchanges. In its analysis of November 9, Elliptic puts the theft at Binance at $6.4 billion and attributes it to the TraderTraitor group, which the firm links to North Korea. Binance itself says it has fully reimbursed the $6.34 billion loss, as cryptoticker.io reported on November 13.

For NEAR holders, one figure in the analysis matters most: around 11.8 million NEAR from the loot had not moved at the time of the review. Elliptic valued them at $43.7 million then. At today's price of $3.34 they are worth roughly $39.4 million.

One point is important for context: the analysis does not describe a flaw in the NEAR protocol. Elliptic states explicitly that the tool used to create the tokens, the exchange involved and the wallet app did nothing wrong. The attackers used them exactly as any other user could.

Six throwaway tokens: how the laundering ran through the NEAR blockchain

Money laundering means disguising the origin of illegally obtained assets so that they can later be used like legitimate money. According to Elliptic, the attackers created six new tokens for this purpose between November 5 and 7, with the tickers FUK, OLCCL, MEILI, MMLI, DABI and SINU. Each cost around 25 NEAR to create, or about $90.

Each of these tokens was given its own liquidity pool against NEAR. A liquidity pool is a pot of two coins on a decentralised exchange that users can trade against without a counterparty. One group of wallets bought the new tokens with stolen NEAR, a second group sold them again and received NEAR in return, which at first glance appear to come from ordinary trading. Elliptic's data show that wallets in the attackers' network made every single sale of all six tokens and bought every single unit of five of them.

In this way, around 117,000 NEAR worth roughly $430,000 flowed through the six tokens. None of them traded after November 8. On the afternoon of that day, the creators of four of the tokens pulled the remaining liquidity out of the pools.

A familiar pattern from the Bybit case

The method is not new. Elliptic first documented it in 2025 with the proceeds of the Bybit hack, at the time on the Tron blockchain and involving at least $24 million. In the Binance case, Elliptic found a Tron token on November 2, followed a day later by tokens on Solana and then the six on NEAR. The analysts conclude that the technique slows investigators down but does not hide the funds, and that each token is so cheap it can be thrown away after a single use.

Token overhang in proportion: 0.9 percent of supply, 8 percent of a day's trading

A token overhang is a quantity of coins held by a few hands that can hit the market at any time. Two comparisons show how much weight the 11.8 million NEAR carry. According to CoinGecko, around 1.31 billion NEAR are in circulation, so the dormant stash equals about 0.9 percent of supply. Measured against trading it looks larger: over the past 24 hours, NEAR worth around $473 million changed hands, which at the current price is about 141.7 million tokens. The stolen coins therefore amount to a little more than 8 percent of a day's trading.

cryptoticker.io compiled this analysis itself on November 14, 2026. It is based on the holdings reported by Elliptic and on the circulating supply and 24-hour trading volume from CoinGecko.

A sale of this size in one go would be noticeable, but it would not overwhelm the market. The pattern so far also argues against a quick exit: through the throwaway tokens, the attackers moved only about one percent of the stash, spread over several days.

NEAR since November 12: the $3.40 level has given way

On November 12, cryptoticker.io examined the slide to $3.40 on November 12. At the time, forced closures of long positions in the futures market led the decline, and there was no news from the NEAR network. The article named $3.15, the level of September 18, as the next support.

Since then NEAR has lost roughly another two percent and fallen below that day's low of $3.36. What is new is the focus on the loot from the Binance hack, which played no part in the price debate back then. The $3.15 level has not been reached yet; the distance is a little over five percent.

Wider market at Fear and Greed 13: bitcoin and ether each lose 4 percent

NEAR is not falling alone. Bitcoin costs $66,876 and is down 4.0 percent in 24 hours, while ether trades at $1,894, also 4.0 percent lower (CoinGecko, November 14, 14:50). Among the 25 largest cryptocurrencies excluding stablecoins, almost every one is in the red, with Solana, Avalanche, Cardano and Hyperliquid each down more than seven percent.

The Fear and Greed Index from alternative.me stands at 13, in the extreme fear zone. The index combines price volatility, trading volume, social media sentiment and other factors into a single value between 0 and 100. Readings below 25 are considered extreme fear.

NEAR is thus falling almost twice as hard as bitcoin. That is common for smaller coins in a weak market, because investors in such phases cut positions in riskier assets first.

Our view: the dormant NEAR stash is a risk, not the cause

Our assessment: today's price drop cannot be attributed to the stolen coins. One reason is that the whole market is falling and NEAR is moving in line with other altcoins such as Avalanche or Cardano. Another is that, up to November 9, Elliptic described movements of only around 117,000 NEAR, a small part of the loot. We do not have an analysis from after that date.

What argues against giving the all-clear is that 11.8 million NEAR are in hands that do not decide on the basis of price or tax, but on how best to blur their origin. When and how these coins will move is impossible for outsiders to predict. The main conclusion for you: size any NEAR position so that a further fall of ten or 20 percent would not put your finances under strain.

NEAR price levels: $3.30 as the daily low, $3.15 from September

For now, three levels help with orientation. The first is the daily low at $3.30. Below that comes $3.15, where NEAR stood on September 18 before the autumn rally began. On the upside, the 24-hour high of $3.59 is the first hurdle.

A support is a price zone where buyers have slowed a decline in the past. There are no guarantees. In a market gripped by extreme fear, such levels are more often breached briefly before a new floor forms or the decline continues.

Buying NEAR in the EU: MiCA licence, staking and leverage

Anyone buying or holding NEAR now should know three points. The list is no substitute for advice; it shows where the risks lie.

Check the exchange's MiCA licence

MiCA is the EU regulation on markets in crypto-assets, which requires exchanges and custodians in the EU to be authorised. Only buy NEAR from a provider listed as a crypto-asset service provider in the register of the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA). Which platforms these are and what they charge is shown in our comparison of regulated crypto exchanges with a MiCA licence. Especially after a hack of this scale, how well an exchange segregates and protects customer funds is no minor detail.

How gains and losses on crypto are taxed depends on the country you live in; tools that log every purchase are compared in our overview of crypto tax software.

Staking yield and the issuance cut

NEAR can be staked, that is, delegated to validators that secure the network and receive newly issued tokens as a reward. On November 2, the governance platform House of Stake voted by a large majority to cut the maximum annual issuance of new NEAR gradually from 2.5 to 1.6 percent, as cryptoticker.io reported on November 3. The change has not yet taken effect.

Leverage in extreme fear

Anyone trading NEAR with leverage via futures risks liquidation in a market at Fear and Greed 13. A liquidation is the forced closure of a leveraged position when the posted collateral no longer covers the losses. At ten times leverage, a drop of just under ten percent is enough, roughly down to the $3.00 level.

NEAR overhang: while the coins stay put, the $3.15 level is what counts

The key points in brief: NEAR is at its lowest since mid-September, mainly because of the weak overall market. The 11.8 million stolen NEAR are not the reason for today's drop, but they remain an open risk equal to around 8 percent of a day's trading. If you are invested in NEAR or considering buying in, three steps will help:

1. Check the exchange: only hold or buy NEAR with a provider that has MiCA authorisation. The options are listed in the comparison of regulated crypto exchanges.
2. Compare staking providers: if you plan to hold NEAR for longer, compare the platforms' yields, fees and lock-up periods in the staking comparison.
3. Record your purchases: log each tranche with date and price so that your tax records add up later. Suitable tools are in the crypto tax software comparison.

(As of November 14, 2026. This article is not investment advice. Prices and fee structures change; check the terms with the provider before you buy.)