Mistaken BTC distributions trigger price plunge before most coins are recovered. Within about 35 minutes of the erroneous transfers, Bithumb froze trading and withdrawals for the 695 affected users and recovered roughly 99.7 per cent of the mistakenly distributed bitcoins, the exchange told Reuters in a statement. The incident unfolded on the platform’s ledger and quickly spread across crypto feeds and social platforms. On Friday, Bithumb — one of South Korea’s largest digital asset exchanges — launched a promotion intended to credit customers with a small cash bonus of about 2,000 Korean won (roughly $1.37) each.
Instead, due to what the company later described as a distribution error, winners were credited with at least 2,000 bitcoins each, collectively amounting to roughly 620,000 bitcoins — worth approximately $44 billion at current prices. The scale of the mishap briefly spooked traders. On Bithumb’s own charts, bitcoin prices slumped as much as 17 per cent in response to the sudden influx of sell orders tied to the distributed coins before recovering later. Market analysts and regulators alike reacted swiftly.
South Korea’s Financial Services Commission held an emergency meeting after the incident, saying it exposed “vulnerabilities and risks of virtual assets” and stating regulators could launch on-site inspections of Bithumb and other exchanges based on internal control audits. The event has reignited broader debates over the reliability of automated systems in crypto exchanges, where promotional tools, smart contracts and automated scripts frequently interact with billions of dollars in digital assets. In recent years, other high-profile exchange failures and hacks — such as the 2018 Bithumb security breach and other platform exploits — have already drawn global scrutiny over crypto-asset risk management. Despite the scale of the blunder, Bithumb says it absorbed the costs and covered any losses from its own capital.
During a promotional reward event, South Korea’s Bithumb mistakenly credited at least 2,000 bitcoins to each of 695 users, totaling roughly 620,000 BTC worth about $44 billion at current prices. The incident appeared on the platform’s ledger and quickly spread across crypto feeds and social platforms. The promotion was intended to credit customers with a small cash bonus of about 2,000 won each, but distribution error caused the larger credit. The scale of the misallocation briefly spooked traders, and bitcoin prices on the exchange slumped before rebounding.
Within about 35 minutes of the erroneous transfers, Bithumb froze trading and withdrawals for the affected accounts and recovered roughly 99.7% of the distributed BTC, according to Reuters. The company emphasised that the error was not caused by hacking or a security breach, and that there were no problems with system security or customer asset management. The incident prompted regulators to review risk controls on automated trading and other crypto-asset operations. Despite the scale of the blunder, Bithumb absorbed the costs from its own capital, underscoring ongoing questions about the resilience of automated systems in crypto markets.
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