Bloomberg: Top Mt. Gox creditor opts for Bitcoin payout

The largest creditor of the defunct cryptocurrency exchange Mt. Gox has chosen an early Bitcoin payout. Bloomberg reports, citing its own source.

According to him, the Mt. Gox Investment Fund decided not to wait for the platform’s litigation to conclude, which could take up to nine years. The fund will receive 90% of the amount due to it by the end of September 2023.

In the long term, the payouts could yield a higher recovery rate.

The agency noted that the fund’s selection to receive payouts in cryptocurrency reduces concerns about selling pressure that could weigh on the price.

The creditors of the exchange must decide by March 10 in what form they are willing to receive the compensation.

Mt. Gox, once the largest Bitcoin exchange, collapsed in early 2014 after reports of its alleged hack and the theft of 800,000 BTC (about $480 million at the time).

The process of reimbursing creditors began in 2018. Since then, many in the community have warned that about 150,000 BTC (~$3.6 billion at the time of writing), which could be handed to exchange users, would hit the market and trigger a collapse.

Earlier, Mt. Gox custodian Nobuaki Kobayashi began preparing for compensation payments in July 2022.