Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/266345 
Year of Publication: 
2022
Series/Report no.: 
IWH Discussion Papers No. 25/2022
Publisher: 
Halle Institute for Economic Research (IWH), Halle (Saale)
Abstract: 
Bitcoin plunged by 30% on May 19, 2021. We examine the outage the largest crypto exchange Binance experienced during the crash, when it halted trading for retail clients and stopped providing transaction data. We find evidence that Binance back-filled these missing transactions with data that does not conform to Benford's Law. The Bitcoin futures price difference between Binance and other exchanges was seven times larger during the crash period compared to a prior reference period. Data manipulation is a plausible explanation for our findings. These actions are in line with Binance aiming to limit losses for its futures-related insurance fund.
Subjects: 
Benford's law
Binance
Bitcoin
cryptocurrency
crypto exchange
derivatives
extreme volatility
fraud
market crash
trading outage
JEL: 
G10
G12
G14
K22
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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