A South Korean crypto exchange made a shocking mistake, accidentally depositing over $40 billion in Bitcoin into customer accounts. This blunder occurred during a giveaway event, where the intention was to award prizes worth just a few cents each. The error at Bithumb, South Korea's second-largest cryptocurrency exchange, briefly transformed ordinary users into nine-figure Bitcoin holders and caused a brief crash in the country's closely monitored digital-asset market.
The incident took place on a Friday when a Bithumb employee was tasked with distributing giveaway prizes totaling 620,000 Korean won, approximately $425, as part of a promotional event. However, the employee mistakenly entered the amount in Bitcoin instead of Korean won, resulting in 620,000 bitcoins being credited across hundreds of customer accounts, a sum worth over $40 billion at the time.
Only 249 out of 695 qualifying customers opened their prize boxes and received the erroneous payouts, according to regulators. Bitcoin was trading at just under $70,000 per coin, meaning the mistaken credits briefly made recipients multimillionaires on paper.
The exchange detected the error within minutes and took swift action to halt trading and withdrawals on affected accounts within about 35 minutes, according to regulators. However, this short window caused chaos. Some users sold the phantom Bitcoin before controls were fully in place, triggering a sharp, localized plunge in prices on Bithumb.
At one point, Bitcoin prices on the platform fell by 15-17%, significantly lower than prices on rival South Korean exchanges. Financial authorities later revealed that 86 customers managed to sell about 1,788 bitcoins before the freeze took effect. Some proceeds were withdrawn to bank accounts, while other funds were used to purchase different cryptocurrencies.
Bithumb has since recovered 99.7% of the mistakenly credited Bitcoin by reversing internal ledger entries and persuading users to return the assets. However, approximately 125 bitcoins, worth around $9 million, remain unrecovered. The exchange has stated its intention to absorb the loss.
In a public apology, Bithumb emphasized that the incident was not due to hacking or a security breach. The company stated, "We want to make it clear that this matter has nothing to do with external hacking or security breaches, and there is no problem with system security or customer asset management."
