India's biggest crypto exchange just got a lifeline after getting completely rekt by hackers last year.

WazirX's creditors overwhelmingly approved the exchange's restructuring plan, with 93.1% voting in favor of the proposal.

For users who've been locked out of their funds since July, this might be the first good news in almost a year.

The Hack From Hell

Last July, WazirX got hit with one of the nastiest exploits in recent memory.

Hackers made off with a staggering $235 million in user funds after breaking into the exchange's multisig wallets.

Nearly half of WazirX's reserves vanished faster into the Gordian knot of on-chain tumblers and swappers.

The Lazarus Group – North Korea's personal crypto ATM – took responsibility for the attack, adding another exchange to their ever-growing trophy case.

Turns out those hardware wallets and multisig setups weren't enough to stop state-sponsored hackers with a missile program to fund.

Creditors Said "Yes Please"

The restructuring vote wasn't even close – 131,659 creditors representing $185 million in claims voted to approve the plan.

That's 94.6% by value, absolutely crushing the required 75% threshold.

When creditors agree on anything crypto-related, you know things must be desperate.

Nischal Shetty, WazirX's founder, called it a "strong vote of confidence," which is a nice way of saying "thanks for not forcing us into bankruptcy."

The Next Steps

The plan now heads to Singapore's High Court for final approval, since WazirX's parent company Zettai is based there.

If the court gives the thumbs up, users could see up to 85% of their crypto returned in the first distribution phase.

That's significantly better than the typical "you're never seeing your money again" scenario that usually follows exchange hacks.

Zettai has supposedly committed $284 million in liquid assets and recovery tokens to make users whole.

But if the court rejects the plan, liquidation looms – and creditors might be waiting until 2030 to get anything back.

That's practically a century in crypto years.

Security Lessons No One Will Learn

WazirX thought they were doing everything right with hardware wallets, multisig setups, and address whitelisting.

But it turns out that their smart contract interface was the attack vector – the same approach that saw Bybit lose around $1.5 billion. 

We've seen this same story over and over with exchanges lately – no matter how many security measures exchanges implement, hackers keep finding new ways to drain funds.

Yet centralized exchanges still hold billions in user deposits.

India's Crypto Moment

For India's crypto scene, this recovery plan represents more than just money.

WazirX was the country's flagship exchange before getting hacked into oblivion.

Its survival or collapse could shape India's entire approach to crypto regulation going forward.

The fact that nearly all creditors backed this plan shows there's still faith in the platform despite everything that's happened.

Whether that faith is misplaced remains to be seen.

The Road to Recovery

Trading and withdrawals should resume in phases if everything goes according to plan.

Users will be watching closely to see if WazirX keeps its promises or if this turns into another Celsius-style disappointment.

For now, WazirX holders can at least see a glimmer of hope after nine months in the dark.

In the wild west of crypto, sometimes getting back 85 cents on the dollar counts as a happy ending.