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Bitcoin (BTC) fell below $17,000 on Nov. 9 as rumors spread over crypto exchange Binance exiting a deal to buy embattled competitor FTX.

Binance CEO: “Do not trade FTT”

Data from Cointelegraph Markets Pro and TradingView showed BTC/USD hitting $16,936 on Bitstamp before rebounding.

The latest dive hit an already shaky market, which had reacted badly to news that FTX asked Binance for financial assistance.

In a note to staff shared on Twitter, Binance CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao told them to refrain from trading FTX’s in-house FTX Token (FTT).

“I want to remind everyone: DO NOT trade FTT tokens. If you have a bag, you have a bag,” it read.

Blockchain software technology firm ConsenSys continues working on expanding blockchain interoperability by introducing a new tool to the MetaMask wallet.

Metamask users can now bridge across multiple blockchain networks using MetaMask Bridges, which aggregates different blockchain bridges in one place, ConsenSys announced on Nov. 9.

MetaMask Bridges supports major blockchains compatible with Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), including Ethereum, Avalanche, the Binance Smart Chain and Polygon. The new tool allows bridges of Ether (ETH) and Wrapped Ether (WETH), major stablecoins and native gas tokens, the firm said.

The new bridge feature enables Metamask users to move tokens from one blockchain network to another without having to do research to find and choose a reliable bridge.

“There are a ton of different bridges out there, each supporting various networks and tokens,” MetaMask Bridges product manager Angela Potter told Cointelegraph. She noted that bridge costs, speed and security properties vary a lot from one bridge to another, requiring users to manually check a lot of data each time before proceeding with a bridge.

Solana (SOL) is on the track to log its worst daily performance on record.

On Nov. 9, SOL's price dropped more than 40% to around $16 primarily due to its association with Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder of crypto-focused hedge fund Alameda Research and cryptocurrency exchange FTX.

Sam tokens get 'fried'

Fried was an early investor in the Solana blockchain project via Alameda Research. On Nov. 8, the entrepreneur's estimated wealth plunged from a whopping $15.6 billion to around $1 billion, according to Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

At the core of this wipeout was a near-collapse of FTX. On Nov. 6, Binance, FTX's rival exchange and early investor decided to sell its $2 billion stake, which it was holding in the form of FTX's native token, (FTT). In response, FTT's price crashed by over 85% and was trading for around $3.60 as of Nov. 9.

Alameda Research's balance sheet reportedly was worth around $12 billion as of June 30, out of which half was FTT. The firm allegedly had $8 billion in liabilities on the same day, raising speculation about its potential insolvency after FTT's massive crash.

Solana (SOL) is on the track to log its worst daily performance on record.

On Nov. 9, SOL’s price dropped more than 40% to around $16 primarily due to its association with Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder of crypto-focused hedge fund Alameda Research and cryptocurrency exchange FTX.

Sam tokens get ‘fried’

Fried was an early investor in the Solana blockchain project via Alameda Research. On Nov. 8, the entrepreneur’s estimated wealth plunged from a whopping $15.6 billion to around $1 billion, according to Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

At the core of this wipeout was a near-collapse of FTX. On Nov. 6, Binance, FTX’s rival exchange and early investor, decided to sell its $2 billion stake, which it was holding in the form of FTX’s native token, FTX Token (FTT). In response, FTT’s price crashed by over 85% and was trading for around $3.60 as of Nov. 9.

Alameda Research’s balance sheet reportedly was worth around $12 billion as of June 30, out of which half was FTT. The firm allegedly had $8 billion in liabilities on the same day, raising speculation about its potential insolvency after FTT’s massive crash.

The rumors about the possible liquidity crisis for the world’s third-largest crypto exchange turned out to be true. Just a day after assuring funds are fine, and they have the assets to back customer’s funds, FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) announced on Tuesday that Binance has shown intent to acquire the global crypto platform to help with the liquidity crisis.

The liquidity crunch came as a surprise to many, given FTX bailed out numerous firms during the crypto contagion caused by the downfall of LUNA and the insolvency of 3AC.

Even as the crypto community process the events of the past 24 hours, the focus has now shifted toward other SBF-owned entities, especially Alameda Research, a leading principal trading firm. Alameda and FTX merged their venture capital operations in August 2022. Speculation mills are rife that Alameda reportedly faced a crisis itself during the crypto contagion in the second quarter and FTX bailed it out, which eventually came to bite it back.

Lucas Nuzzi, the head of the crypto analytic firm Coinmetric, took to Twitter to point out the FTT market cap increased 124.3% on September 28 when 173 million FTX Token (FTT) worth over $4 billion became active on-chain. Nuzzi pointed out that on the same day, a total of $8.6 billion worth of FTT tokens were moved on-chain.

Related: SBF tumbles off Bloomberg’s billionaire index after trouble at FTX

As the liquidity crisis and acquisition of cryptocurrency exchange FTX continues, Binance CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao assured his community of insurance of sufficient funds backing the network. 

In a tweet on Nov. 9, CZ said that the exchange has once again topped its Secure Asset Fund for Users (SAFU) at $1 billion equivalent in light of “recent price fluctuations.”

The tweet included links to two reserve accounts, one of which holds both the Binance stablecoin (BUSD) and the native token of the network Binance Coin (BNB) with an equivalent worth of $700 million. 

The other wallet revealed Bitcoin (BTC) holdings worth around $300 million.

Binance’s SAFU began in 2018 by allocating 10% of the trading fee into a fund that is solely dedicated to backing up user holdings in the case of an incident. In February of this year, the fund hit $1 billion for the first time.