- Crypto lending startup sent promo payouts in Bitcoin instead of US Dollars
- Many users have withdrawn the money
- The amount is very minuscule of what BlockFi carries as loss reserves
Bloomberg reports that a crypto lending startup BlockFi Inc erroneously sent some users Bitcoin as a part of an advertising campaign. The amount sent by error amounts to $10 million. The company has said that it is working to reverse the mistake. BlockFi Inc is a crypto lending startup that offers crypto asset-backed USD loans to crypto-asset owners.
$10 million was involved in the fiasco
BlockFi Inc revealed that it sent promo payouts in Bitcoin instead of US Dollars to some customers. Bloomberg reports that BlockFi Inc is trying to correct the mistake, but many recipients have withdrawn the coins before the company could reverse them. The company revealed that $10 million was involved in the fiasco, but the amount is decreasing as users have started returning the money.
Loss is very small
Bloomberg quoted Zac Prince, co-founder, and chief executive officer of BlockFi, who said that the amount was a fraction of what BlockFi carries as loss reserves as part of its accounting policies. Price added that remedial measures are being taken to preempt any recurrence of this mistake in the future. The error has not stopped the ongoing operations. BlockFi is notching record levels of trading volume without interruption.
Efforts to prevent such errors in future
The social media featured screenshots of the deposits, and a Tweet confirmed that a deposit of 700 Bitcoin was made. BTC is trading around $34,000 Wednesday. The mistake was detected Last week, and BlockFi tweeted that some promotion participants could get inaccurate bonuses. However, this mistake is being rectified by the BlockFi team. The company has asked the users for the money to be refunded.
With a background in journalism, Ritika Sharma has worked with many reputed media firms focusing on general news such as politics and crime. She joined The Coin Republic as a reporter for crypto, and found a great passion for cryptocurrency, Web3, NFTs and other digital assets. She spends a lot of time researching and delving deeper into these concepts around the clock, and is a strong advocate for women in STEM.