Court Orders Bithumb Client to Return $140,400 for Erroneously Credited Bitcoin

The Seoul Central District Court ordered a client of Bithumb, South Korea’s second-largest cryptocurrency exchange, to return 194 million won (approximately $140,400) after selling Bitcoin that had been erroneously credited to their account in February. The court ruled that the funds obtained by the client constituted unjust enrichment.

The court’s decision specifically concerns the proceeds from the sale of the erroneously credited Bitcoin, rather than the assets themselves, which may still be held in the client’s account. This marks Bithumb’s second such victory in court within two days: previously, a court ordered another exchange client to return 5 million won ($3,620). Two additional lawsuits totaling 14.8 million won ($10,700) and 500 million won ($362,000) are currently under review. The total amount of all four lawsuits amounts to approximately 714 million won ($517,000).

The incident involving the erroneous Bitcoin credit occurred in early February during a KRW coin airdrop. An exchange employee mistakenly specified Bitcoin instead of South Korean won, resulting in internal records showing a credit of 620,000 BTC to hundreds of accounts. These figures significantly exceeded the actual number of Bitcoin held in Bithumb’s wallets, which amounted to approximately 40,000 BTC. Trading continued for about 40 minutes, with 1,788 BTC entering the order book.

The exchange managed to cancel most of the erroneous credits on the same day, and on March 10, Bithumb announced the return of 99.7% of the Bitcoin accidentally sent to clients. In April, Bithumb initiated legal proceedings to recover the remaining Bitcoin.

The incident attracted the attention of South Korean financial regulators, who viewed it as a failure in the exchange’s control system. The Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) proposed using automated systems to detect suspicious trading, analyzing data on a second-by-second and minute-by-minute basis.