South Korea probing Bithumb’s +$40 billion Bitcoin rewards mishap – Report 

South Korea has launched a full probe into Bithumb and the broader {industry} after the trade mistakenly despatched over $40 billion price of Bitcoin to prospects final Friday. 

In line with CryptoQuant, the trade, the second-largest in South Korea, held about 46,000 BTC simply earlier than the incident. Primarily based on regulatory filings, most of those had been buyer funds, whereas the trade owned lower than 200 BTC as of Q3 2025. 

On Friday, nevertheless, the trade despatched 620,000 BTC by mistake as buyer rewards – Practically 13-14x greater than its reported holdings. 

Swift regulatory response to rein in exchanges

Evidently, Bithumb’s ‘ghost Bitcoin’ mistake has raised extra questions than solutions. 

For regulators, this was greater than a mistake. That’s the reason this incident turned an escalation of the Bithumb probe into an industry-wide audit.  

In line with the monetary sector watchdog Monetary Supervisory Service (FSS), on-site inspections have been initiated and formal investigations will observe if authorized violations are established. 

In a press convention on Monday, FSS Governor Lee Chan-jin stated, 

“It was nothing greater than erroneously entered digital knowledge, but it ended up being traded. That’s the essence of the difficulty. The transaction was truly executed.”

Initially, the trade was to ship 2,00 gained or $1.37 as rewards, totalling $423. As a substitute, it ended up sending over $40 billion in Bitcoin. Some customers cashed out the BTC rewards, however over 90% of the funds had been recovered, in response to Bithumb. 

The trade apologized for the error and promised adjustments to boost its inner management programs. 

“We’ve got reported it to all related authorities and are absolutely cooperating with the continued Monetary Supervisory Service inspection. We are going to use programs and processes to forestall human error from turning into an accident.”

In the meantime, regulators stated the probe’s findings can be used to additional strengthen regulation within the sector. The FSS Governor added, 

“If we can’t correctly resolve the ghost coin concern, how can (the digital asset market) be included into the system? The inspection outcomes have been mirrored within the duties that should be strongly supplemented within the second part of laws.”

Traders reactions to ‘ghost Bitcoin’ error

Following the incident, over 4,100 BTC had been moved off the trade on Friday – A ecord excessive since early 2025. Over the identical interval, Bithumb’s total reserves declined sharply from 46.7K BTC to 41.7K BTC – A ten% decline.  

Prior to now few days, nevertheless, the outflows have dropped to under 500 BTC on a each day common. This appeared illustrative of measured investor habits, regardless of the continued probe. 

Supply: CryptoQuant 

Ultimate Ideas

• South Korea has launched a probe into Bithumb’s ‘ghost Bitcoin’ and plans to increase the audit into the broader crypto {industry}.
• In line with the officers, the findings will assist inform the second part of laws for the sector.