Well, that’s one way to see your investment pay off. In 2014, the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world, Mt. Gox, suffered a notorious hack that stole 850,000 Bitcoins from the platform. Victims are finally starting to get their money back on Tuesday, nearly 10 years later. However, some are reporting Mt. Gox accidentally sent “double payments” and the trustees are asking for some of it back.
“Due to a system issue, the transfer of money to you was inadvertently made twice,” said Mt. Gox in an email numerous creditors posted on Reddit. “Please note that you are not authorized to receive the second transfer and are legally obligated to return the above amount to the Rehabilitation Trustee.”
The hack caused Mt. Gox to file for bankruptcy in 2014. At the end of that year, 850,000 Bitcoin was roughly worth $272 million, but Bitcoin prices have since skyrocketed, and it’s now worth over $35 billion. For the last 10 years, creditors have been waiting for Mt. Gox trustees to recoup stolen funds. Trustees recovered roughly 20% of the hack, and victims finally started to see repayments hit their PayPal accounts on Tuesday. However, Mt. Gox is reportedly asking for some of it back.
The victims of the Mt. Gox hack can’t catch a break. The email from Mt. Gox says some users received two identical payments, the first was the official repayment, while the second was an error, which the trustees would like to be sent back. Users on the Mt. Gox insolvency subreddit expressed frustration that after 10 years of waiting, they are still not done with this fiasco. Mt. Gox has yet to release an official comment on the situation, so many of these details are still unclear.
Creditors had the option of receiving their funds via cryptocurrency, wire transfer to their bank accounts, or PayPal. It appears only PayPal repayments were initiated on Tuesday. Mt. Gox admins have until October of 2024 to finish repaying its creditors, according to CoinDesk. The large Bitcoin repayments are unlikely to destabilize crypto markets, according to UBS analysts. However, the price of Bitcoin fell over 3% on Tuesday.