Bitfinex received the assets from the US Homeland Security, the crypto exchange announced in a Thursday release. US authorities had previously seized stolen digital assets and prosecuted individuals involved in the 2016 Bitfinex hack.
“We are extremely pleased to be able to reach another successful milestone in the recovery of assets stolen from Bitfinex in 2016”, said Paolo Ardoino, Bitfinex’s Chief Technology Officer. “We look forward to recovering as much of the stolen Bitcoin as we possibly can and redistributing that to holders of the tokens that were issued in response to the hack in 2016.”
The recovered assets will be given to holders of Recovery Right Tokens (RRT) – the token issued to those affected by the 2016 hack. RRT holders can redeem their tokens at a 1:1 ratio for USD. The allocation process to RRT holders starts on July 6, 2023 (UTC).
In 2016, Bitfinex lost 119,756 BTC in a security breach. Since then, the US government has investigated and recovered a large amount of assets involved in the hack. In Feb 2022, the Department of Justice recovered 94,000 BTC, worth $3.6 billion.