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Bithumb

bitcoin exchange based in South Korea

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJul 1, 2026
Entity authorityQ55730566
Source-derived summary

Bithumb (Korean: 빗썸) is a South Korean cryptocurrency exchange. Founded in 2014, with headquarters in Seoul, it initially went by the name Xcoin, but was rebranded as Bithumb in 2015.

History

In October 2018, BK Global Consortium signed an agreement to acquire a majority stake in BTC Holding Co., Bithumb's largest investor.

On January 22, 2019, the OTC-listed holding company Blockchain Industries signed a binding letter of intent to merge with Bithumb on or before March 1, 2019. The proposal called for the creation of a new publicly traded entity, the Blockchain Exchange Alliance (BXA), which would seek to uplist on either the New York Stock Exchange or NASDAQ, potentially making BXA the first major cryptocurrency exchange to go public.

On April 11, 2019, Bithumb reported a net loss of KRW205.5 billion (US$180 million) for 2018, compared with a profit of KRW427.2 billion in 2017, although its 2018 sales had risen 17.5% to KRW391.7 million. The company attributed the loss to the sharp decline in cryptocurrency prices and lower trading volume.

Controversy

In June 2017, hackers stole user information from a Bithumb employee's personal computer.

In January 2018, Bithumb was raided by the government for alleged tax evasion. They were found not guilty, but still had to pay nearly $28 million in back taxes.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Bithumb” is bitcoin exchange based in South Korea. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Bithumb, bitcoin and exchange, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA concise reference frame for defining the subject, testing terminology and identifying the institution closest to the evidence. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—2014, 2015, 2018, 2019—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 2013. For this dossier, Bithumb, bitcoin and exchange is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “bitcoin exchange based in South Korea” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 1, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q55730566. None of the 2 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 2014, 2015, 2018 and 2019.

Critical limits

The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
Verify next

The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Bithumb”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Bithumb primary sources, Bithumb archive and Bithumb research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Bithumb”?
  2. Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
  3. Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
Subject index

Search terms from this dossier

Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Bithumb” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.