Overview
- Bithumb says an employee entered BTC instead of Korean won during a promotional reward, creating large ledger-only balances in hundreds of accounts.
- Some recipients sold immediately, pushing the exchange’s BTC/KRW price roughly 10–17% below other markets to about ₩81.1 million (around $55,000) before stabilizing within minutes.
- The exchange restricted trading and withdrawals for affected accounts within about 35 minutes and reports recovering roughly 618,212 of 620,000 BTC, with customer assets said to remain secure.
- Bithumb will compensate users who sold at unfavorable prices by covering the full loss spread plus a 10% bonus, and it estimates customer losses at about 1 billion won.
- South Korea’s Financial Services Commission and Financial Supervisory Service launched reviews and on-site checks as figures on affected users continue to be reconciled.