Bithumb, one of South Korea’s leading cryptocurrency exchanges, made headlines after approximately $43 billion worth of Bitcoin was accidentally transferred to hundreds of users’ accounts. Following the incident, South Korean regulators launched an investigation into the exchange.
Due to a technical error last week, some users were mistakenly credited with 2,000 BTC (approximately $140 million at the time of writing) instead of 2,000 Korean won (approximately $1.37).
These transfers occurred solely on the company’s internal ledgers; no actual Bitcoin movement took place on the blockchain. However, these “paper Bitcoin” balances triggered intense selling pressure on the platform. Due to the accidental sell-off, the price of Bitcoin on Bithumb briefly dropped to the $55,000 level.
The head of South Korea’s Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) said at a press conference today that the error “exposed structural problems in the ledger systems of virtual asset exchanges.”
The agency has initiated an on-site audit of Bithumb’s operations. Officials stated that the incident revealed “fundamental weaknesses” and “regulatory gaps.”
A spokesperson for the ruling Democratic Party also stated that the incident was “no minor issue” and clearly revealed the structural vulnerabilities of cryptocurrency exchanges. The spokesperson added that establishing a real-time verification system between ledger records and actual blockchain assets is now an urgent necessity that can no longer be postponed.
*This is not investment advice.
