Gox Begins $2.9 Billion Bitcoin Transfer After Half a Decade

Last updated: May 28, 2024 01:38 EDT | 1 minute reading

Defunct cryptocurrency exchange Mt. Gox transferred around 137,000 Bitcoin, valued at around $9.3 billion, in early Asian hours on Tuesday, according to data from Arkham Intelligence. These massive transfers were sent to a single anonymous walletahead of Mt. Gox’s schedule to repay BTC holdings to creditors by October.

According to Arkham, the transactions occurred on May 28 between 1:41 am and 4:46 am UTC. Furthermore, most of them cost around 2,000 BTC each. Bitcoin price fell slightly to $67,787 after reaching a high of $70,600 on Monday.

Gox, which once handled the majority of Bitcoin transactions worldwide, started in 2010. However, in 2011, hackers stole a huge amount of Bitcoin from the exchange, leading to its bankruptcy in 2014. Millions of dollars worth of Bitcoin were lost, including clients’ funds and Mt. Gox’s own equity.

Although some Bitcoins were later recovered, legal issues in Japan have slowed the process of returning funds to those who lost money in the hack. Last year, US authorities charged two Russians with conspiring to hack Mt. Gox’s servers.

Mt.Gox prepares to release Bitcoin to creditors

Mt. Gox is almost completing its closure process and aims to distribute Bitcoin holdings to creditors in stages until October 31st. This includes initial, average and final one-time payments. A major concern is whether these lenders will immediately sell their Bitcoin, potentially causing a price crash.

Recently, analysts at K33 Research said Gox selling its Bitcoin could cause market jitters and potentially reduce the price of Bitcoin.

The recent activity on Mt. Gox wallets marks the first movement since May 2018, according to CryptoQuant.

Previously, the defunct platform held approximately 137,892 Bitcoin, along with Bitcoin Money and fiat currency, as per previous records. Part of the fiat currency has already been refunded. Bitcoin Cash fell nearly 5% on Tuesday.

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