Cryptocurrencies dropped after the second South Korean exchange in as many weeks said it was the victim of a theft, renewing concerns about the safety of digital-asset trading venues.
Bithumb, ranked No. 7 globally by traded value on Coinmarketcap.com, yesterday said that hackers stole about 35 billion won (US$31.6 million) and that Ripple was among the coins taken.
The exchange halted cryptocurrency deposits and withdrawals, said it would compensate victims and moved investor assets to a so-called cold wallet, which is disconnected from the Internet and less vulnerable to theft.
Photo: Bloomberg
Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency, dropped as much as 2 percent and was trading at US$6,616 as of 8:25am in London, bringing this year’s decline to 54 percent, according to Bloomberg composite pricing.
Ripple, Ethereum and Litecoin also retreated, along with some Asia-listed stocks with exposure to digital currencies.
Enthusiasm for virtual currencies has waned this year partly due to a string of heists, including the nearly US$500 million theft from Japanese exchange Coincheck Inc in late January.
South Korean venue Coinrail last week said that some of the exchange’s digital coins appeared to have been stolen, although it did not disclose the amount.
While news of the latest theft has weighed on sentiment, the reaction has been relatively subdued, said Ryan Rabaglia, head trader at cryptocurrency dealing firm Octagon Strategy Ltd in Hong Kong.
“The market has sort of become a bit more battle-hardened. It can weather the storm on these negative reports,” he said.
The crypto-mania that spread worldwide last year was particularly intense in South Korea, with Bitcoin prices at one point climbing to a 50 percent premium over those in the US.
The speculative fervor has since cooled amid a government crackdown, but South Korean exchanges are still among the world’s most active.
South Korean policymakers are debating comprehensive regulations covering cryptocurrencies, with proposals ranging from shutting down local exchanges to allowing them to operate under increased supervision.
Bithumb said that it reported the theft to the Korea Internet & Security Agency and that officials there are investigating.
The South Korean hacks show “how ill-prepared a lot of the exchanges still are across large markets,” said Vijay Ayyar, the Singapore-based head of business development at Luno, a cryptocurrency exchange.
“The overall market is seeing a lot of regulatory action and incidents like these will only hasten the process,” he added.
Cairo’s new monorail slices across the city skyline, running above the familiar chaos of blaring horns and aging buses’ exhaust fumes that mark rush hour below. The US$4.5 billion monorail, opened this month, is among Egypt’s most prominent new transport projects, part of a debt-funded infrastructure drive criticized for sapping state finances while bringing limited benefits to most of the country’s 109 million people. “It feels like you’re in a different country,” said Ramy Sayed, a restaurant manager, aboard a driverless Innovia 300 train. “No noise, no traffic, we’re not used to this.” The eastern line runs 56km from the bustling middle-class
Taiwanese firms have increased investment in the Philippines in recent years as Manila’s ties with Washington deepen and global supply chains continue to shift away from China, an expert at the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. The Philippines had not been among Taiwanese investors’ top choices in Southeast Asia, CIER Taiwan ASEAN Studies Center director Kristy Hsu (徐遵慈) said at a seminar in Taipei. However, Taiwan’s investment in the country has grown significantly since the COVID-19 pandemic, reaching US $257 million last year, a high in recent years, she said. Although Taiwan’s total investment in the Philippines still lags
Intel Corp regards Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) as a longstanding partner, as the US chipmaker would continue outsourcing production of advanced chips to TSMC, Intel chief executive officer Lip-Bu Tan (陳立武) said yesterday. “I don’t look at people as competitors. I look at the collaboration... Nvidia is also, you know, a good friend,” Tan told a news conference following his keynote speech at the Computex trade show in Taipei. “It’s a very trusted partnership for us... We are a big, top customer for them, and we’re going to continue doing that,” he said, referring to TSMC, the world’s largest foundry
Artificial intelligence (AI) agents would supplant smartphones as the center of people’s digital lives, fundamentally reshaping personal devices and driving a major computing upgrade cycle, Qualcomm Inc CEO Cristiano Amon said yesterday. In his keynote speech for this year’s Computex trade show in Taipei, Amon said that the rise of "agentic AI" — AI systems capable of reasoning, planning and carrying out tasks autonomously — would transform how people interact with technology across phones, PCs, vehicles and wearable devices. Describing the technology as the next major evolution in computing, Amon said that "2026 is the year of agents.” For decades, smartphones have sat
RSS