Bithumb BTC Ledger Glitch Triggers Flash Crash, Raises Questions on Reserve Controls

Bithumb experienced a system malfunction in which its internal ledger briefly showed BTC credits in the hundreds of thousands of coins, far above its roughly 41,843 BTC in verified onchain reserves, official reserve data and social media posts show. Screenshots shared online indicated users saw unexpectedly large Bitcoin balances and executed rapid sell orders, causing the BTC/KRW pair on the Korean exchange to trade at a sharp discount to global markets, with Bitcoin briefly near ₩81 million and reportedly more than 10% below prices elsewhere. One post attributed the imbalance to a reported staff error during an airdrop that sent 2,000 BTC, or about $133M, instead of a small KRW reward, which some users allegedly sold immediately, overwhelming local order books as liquidity thinned and bids disappeared across several levels. Korean lawmakers reportedly described the incident as a structural failure, prompting expectations of audits and formal reviews of Bithumb's accounting and settlement controls as industry observers highlight the risk when internal databases diverge from blockchain-backed reserves.