Bithumb, one of South Korea’s leading crypto exchanges, has been fined by the country’s Anti-Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Agency.
South Korea’s Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) has fined 36.8 billion won ($24.6 million) and ordered a six-month partial suspension after finding millions in violations of the country’s anti-money laundering rules.
The sanctions stem from breaches of the law on the reporting and use of specified information on financial transactions, the Financial Services Commission said, according to local media.
According to the FIU, Bithumb committed around 6.65 million violations. About 3.55 million involved failures to perform required customer identity verification, while 3.04 million were related to instances where the exchange did not properly block transactions that should have been blocked.
The suspension is aimed at services for newly registered users. Existing customers will still be able to trade and move money on the platform, according to initial reports of these sanctions.
Regulators also issued staff fines. Bithumb’s CEO received a reprimand warning, while the exchange’s reporting officer was suspended for six months.
The violations emerged during on-site inspections of South Korea’s five largest crypto exchanges, Upbit, Bithumb, Coinone, Korbit and Gopax, conducted between 2024 and 2025.
The case comes as South Korean regulators tighten supervision of the crypto market. Last year, the FIU gave Dunamu, the operator of the country’s largest exchange, Upbit, a three-month partial suspension and a fine of 35.2 billion won for non-compliance. Korbit, a rival platform, faced a smaller penalty of 2.73 billion won along with institutional warnings.
Bithumb, founded in 2014, ranks among the largest exchanges in South Korea by trading volume, according to CoinGecko data. The partial suspension comes just a month after Bithumb mistakenly distributed billions of dollars worth of bitcoin to users.
CoinDesk has reached out to Bithumb for comment, but has not heard back at the time of writing.
