A Seoul court has overturned a six-month partial business suspension on Bithumb, one of South Korea's largest cryptocurrency exchanges. The ruling reverses sanctions imposed in March by the Financial Intelligence Unit over alleged anti-money laundering violations. It remains unclear whether a 36.8 billion won ($24.6 million) fine is also on hold.
The 2nd Administrative Division of the Seoul Administrative Court, presided over by Judge Gong Hyeon-jin, accepted Bithumb's application for a stay of execution on Thursday, according to Yonhap News citing legal sources. The decision halts the suspension that took effect last month, following the FIU's March order. Bithumb, established in 2014 and ranking among South Korea's top exchanges by trading volume per CoinGecko data, had requested the court to end both the suspension and the fine imposed for compliance failures under the Act on Reporting and Using Specified Financial Transaction Information. Regulators accused the exchange of about 6.65 million violations, including 3.55 million failures to verify customer identities and 3.04 million instances of not blocking required transactions. The Financial Services Commission announced the sanctions in March amid heightened scrutiny of the crypto sector. This ruling follows Bithumb's recent mistaken distribution of billions of dollars worth of bitcoin to users two months ago. It also comes as South Korea's Personal Information Protection Commission probes Bithumb, Upbit and others for sharing order books with overseas platforms. For context, in 2025 the FIU penalized Upbit's operator Dunamu with a three-month suspension and 35.2 billion won fine, while Korbit received a 2.73 billion won penalty.
