The exchange's protection fund has recovered from below $200 million but remains well short of where it stood before the hack.
Bitget's customer protection fund has climbed back to $256 million, held as 3,067 bitcoin, as the exchange works to restore confidence after a hack triggered a wave of withdrawals.
The balance is up from below $200 million on Tuesday, meaning the exchange has added at least $56 million to the fund in about a day. Chief Executive Gracy Chen has pledged to lift it above $300 million. At the current level the fund is about $44 million short of that target and roughly 45% below the $464 million it held before the crisis.
Withdrawals reopen in stages
Bitget scheduled USDT withdrawals to resume at 08:00 UTC on Wednesday across the Ethereum, BNB Smart Chain, Solana and Tron networks. Withdrawals of remaining tokens, fiat currency and peer-to-peer trading are set to follow on .
Early signs of money coming back
On-chain tracking points to a shift in direction. About three days after withdrawals first resumed, Bitget began showing net inflows of ether, helped by a high-yield deposit promotion. One address moved about 20,000 ETH, worth roughly $54.7 million, out of the Lido staking protocol and into Bitget's deposit pool.
That detail cuts both ways. A single large depositor can swing flows at an exchange under stress, and a promotional yield is by design a paid incentive. Inflows driven by a handful of wallets chasing a premium rate say less about broad customer confidence than steady deposits from many smaller users would.
The arithmetic of trust
The fund's composition is worth noting. Dividing $256 million by 3,067 BTC implies a bitcoin price of about $83,500, which means the fund's dollar value moves with the market. A 10% drop in bitcoin would pull the balance back toward $230 million without Bitget withdrawing a coin. An exchange that holds its safety buffer in the asset its customers are most likely to flee in a panic carries correlation risk that a dollar-denominated reserve would not.
What to watch
Whether USDT withdrawals process smoothly through Wednesday, whether the phase proceeds on schedule, and whether the fund crosses $300 million. The most meaningful signal would be net inflows that persist after the deposit promotion ends.