Post by : Bianca
Haleem
A major South Korean cryptocurrency exchange, Bithumb, has issued an apology after mistakenly transferring an extremely large amount of bitcoin to customers during a promotional payout.
According to Bithumb, the exchange accidentally sent around 620,000 bitcoins, currently valued at more than $40 billion, to users on Friday. The platform said the error affected 695 users.
The exchange explained that it was supposed to send customers a small promotional reward of about 2,000 won (around $1.37) each. However, due to a mistake in the distribution process, it reportedly sent nearly 2,000 bitcoins per user instead.
Bithumb said it quickly blocked trading and withdrawals for the affected accounts within 35 minutes after the error occurred. The company added that the issue was brought under control within five minutes, after it caused sharp volatility in bitcoin prices on the platform.
Charts on Bithumb showed bitcoin prices briefly fell around 17%, dropping to 81.1 million won, as some users sold the mistakenly transferred coins.
In its official statement released Saturday, Bithumb said the incident was not caused by hacking or a security breach.
The exchange also confirmed it had recovered 99.7% of the transferred bitcoins. It stated that it will use its own assets to cover any remaining losses, ensuring customers are not impacted.
This incident comes during a week of broader weakness in bitcoin prices globally, with the cryptocurrency falling after recent market swings.
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