South Korean cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb said it identified and corrected an internal payout error after an “abnormal amount” of Bitcoin was mistakenly credited to some user accounts during a promotional event, briefly causing sharp price swings on its platform.
In a Friday statement, Bithumb said the price disruption followed sales by recipients of the incorrectly credited BTC. The exchange said it quickly restricted the affected accounts using internal controls, stabilizing prices within minutes and averting cascading liquidations. Bithumb emphasized the incident was not the result of a hack or security breach, caused no loss of customer assets, and that trading, deposits and withdrawals are functioning normally. The company said customer funds remain safely managed and that it will disclose follow-up measures to help prevent similar errors.
Bithumb did not provide an exact figure for the amount involved. Several users on X alleged certain accounts were mistakenly credited with roughly 2,000 BTC, a claim that has not been independently verified.
The episode follows Bithumb’s January disclosure that it had identified about $200 million in dormant customer assets across roughly 2.6 million accounts as part of a recovery campaign. CoinGecko currently assigns Bithumb a trust score of 7 out of 10 and listed about $2.2 billion in 24-hour trading volume at the time of reporting.
Operational issues at centralized exchanges
The incident underscores ongoing operational challenges at centralized cryptocurrency exchanges, which have disrupted users during routine activity and times of market stress. In June, Coinbase said it had reduced unnecessary account freezes by 82% after upgrading machine-learning models and internal infrastructure, addressing longstanding complaints about users being locked out during volatility despite no security breach.
During a major October 10 market sell-off that triggered billions in liquidations, Binance faced user reports that technical problems prevented some traders from closing positions at peak volatility. Binance said its core trading systems remained operational and attributed many liquidations to market conditions, but later provided about $728 million in compensation to affected users.
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