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$44B BTC blunder puts South Korea regulators on alert

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Bithumb mistake sent BTC price to $55,000 on that exchange

South Korea’s top financial watchdog is stepping up oversight of crypto markets days after a local exchange mistakenly distributed billions of dollars worth of bitcoin to users.

The Financial Supervisory Service said Sunday it will launch planned investigations into “high-risk” practices that undermine market order, including large-scale price manipulation by so-called whales, trading schemes tied to suspended deposits and withdrawals, and coordinated pump tactics fueled by social media misinformation.

The watchdog also said it plans to build tools that automatically extract suspicious trading patterns by the second and minute, alongside text-analysis systems using artificial intelligence to flag potential market abuse.

The announcement follows a widely reported exchange error last week in which some users of Bithumb, among the country’s biggest exchanges, were mistakenly credited with at least 2,000 bitcoin each instead of small promotional rewards, a blunder estimated at roughly $44 billion at the time.

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BTC prices dropped 30% compared to the global average at the time, as some recipients tried to sell the assets. The exchange had restricted trading and withdrawals for the 695 affected customers within 35 minutes of the erroneous distribution on Friday.

Regulators said the incident exposed the “vulnerabilities and risks” of virtual assets and signaled they could conduct on-site inspections of exchanges if irregularities are found in internal control systems.

Beyond market manipulation, the FSS said it will introduce punitive fines for IT incidents across the financial sector and raise the security accountability of chief executives and chief information security officers, a shift that could have direct implications for crypto trading platforms.

The agency also confirmed it has set up a preparatory team for the Basic Digital Asset Act, which would expand Korea’s regulatory framework beyond the first phase of crypto rules.

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The crackdown plan reflects a broader push by President Lee Jae-myung to stamp out what he has called “cruel financial practices,” with the FSS also outlining measures to strengthen enforcement against fraud and expand tools to combat voice phishing.

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Crypto World

Societe Generale-FORGE Deploys MiCA-Compliant EURCV Stablecoin on Stellar

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Europe, United States, European Union, Stablecoin, MiCA, Genius Act

Societe Generale-FORGE, the crypto arm of French banking company Societe Generale, has deployed its euro-denominated stablecoin on the Stellar blockchain, completing a multichain expansion first announced in 2025.

The stablecoin, known as EUR CoinVertible (EURCV), is designed to comply with the European Union’s Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) framework and represents a tokenized euro issued by the company for use in digital asset markets.

According to the company, the Stellar deployment is intended to broaden the stablecoin’s use across blockchain-based financial applications and tokenized asset services.

SG-FORGE said Stellar offers high transaction throughput, low network fees and built-in support for tokenized assets. The network also includes a decentralized exchange that allows users to trade digital assets directly onchain.

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Societe Generale-FORGE first launched the EUR CoinVertible (EURCV) stablecoin on Ethereum in April 2023. The stablecoin is fully backed by reserves consisting of bank deposits and high-quality liquid assets on a one-to-one basis, and has a current market cap of around $452 million, according to DefiLlama data.

The development comes weeks after SG-FORGE deployed EUR CoinVertible on the XRP Ledger, then marking the token’s third blockchain network after Ethereum (ETH) and Solana (SOL).

In January, the stablecoin was used by global banking network SWIFT in a pilot that demonstrated the exchange and settlement of tokenized bonds using both fiat and digital currencies.

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Related: Stablecoin payments startup Kast raises $80M at $600M valuation: Report

European stablecoin push

Despite growing interest in euro-denominated tokens, the stablecoin market remains dominated by US dollar-backed assets. Tether’s USDT (USDT) holds a market capitalization of about $185 billion, representing nearly 60% of the sector, while Circle’s USDC (USDC) accounts for roughly $78 billion.

Adoption of digital dollars accelerated in the US after the GENIUS Act passed in July 2025, providing regulatory clarity for stablecoin issuers. Total market capitalization has climbed from around $260 billion on July 20 to more than $314 billion today, per DefiLlama data.

Meanwhile, Europe has taken a more restrictive regulatory approach. The European Union’s MiCA framework introduced new rules for stablecoin issuers in June 2024, requiring companies operating in the European Economic Area to obtain an e-money license in at least one EU member state.

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Europe, United States, European Union, Stablecoin, MiCA, Genius Act
Stablecoin market cap. Source: DefiLlama

The regulation prompted several exchanges, including Coinbase, OKX, Bitstamp, Uphold and Binance, to remove or restrict support for stablecoins that had not secured authorization under the framework. Tether also decided it would discontinue its euro-pegged stablecoin EURT.

In November, European Central Bank officials warned that the growth of US dollar–backed stablecoins could weaken Europe’s monetary sovereignty by increasing reliance on dollar-denominated digital assets.

Magazine: The debate over Bitcoin’s four-year cycle is over: Benjamin Cowen