Singapore Court Dismisses Summary Judgment for $43 Million Bitcoin Dispute

The Singapore International Commercial Court ruled today to dismiss an application of summary judgment for a lawsuit where the plaintiff attempted to reclaim 3,092 bitcoin from a cryptocurrency exchange, document shows.

First filed in April this year by the U.K.-based market maker B2C2, against the Singapore cryptocurrency exchange Quoine, the case has become notable due to the large amount of bitcoin involved. The 3,092 bitcoin at stake worth $3.7 million at the time but spiked to $43 million currently, data from CoinDesk's Bitcoin Price Index shows.

As reported before by CoinDesk, in April B2C2 managed to capture what Quoine called "a technical glitch" and sold 309 ether for 3,092 bitcoin, creating a profit of $3.7 million. Yet, bitcoin, priced at $1,226 at the time, was worth around 25 times more than the ether token, according to CoinDesk's BPI.

Quoine soon reversed the trade without informing B2C2, citing that the market maker's conduct violated the fairness of the market, which subsequently led to B2C2's lawsuit in trying to reclaim the 3,092 bitcoin.

According to the court document, the plaintiff filed an application for a summary judgment, a procedure that aims to reach a court decision based on existing facts without a trial.

Yet, the International Judge Simon Thorley noted that more thorough investigations of facts are needed and thus did not grant a summary judgment application.

One reason, among other reasons cited by the judge, was that the law is not well developed for circumstances where the error is made by computers. As such, the judge concluded that:

“In the present case, I do not consider that the Plaintiff’s responses to the Defendant’s arguments are sufficient to deny it the right to a trial.”

Both B2C2 and Quoine are yet to offer comments on the case.

Correction Note: The article has been updated to reflect that it was the application for a summary judge that was dismissed by the court.

Court image via Shutterstock