Mt. Gox creditors face wait until 2027 for repayments

A Japanese court has extended the repayment deadline for Mt. Gox creditors by one year to Oct. 31, 2027. The bankrupt Bitcoin exchange’s rehabilitation trustee cited continued administrative and payment-processing difficulties.

Rehabilitation trustee Nobuaki Kobayashi announced the extension in an Oct. 16 notice. It applies to Base Repayment, Early Lump-Sum Repayment and Intermediate Repayment under Mt. Gox’s rehabilitation plan.

The notice said payments had largely been completed for creditors who met the required conditions and did not face processing problems, although some payment categories remain outstanding. Many claimants have not been paid because they have yet to complete the required procedures. Others have encountered problems during processing.

The additional year will give the trustee more time to settle outstanding claims where reasonably practicable. The notice did not provide a timetable for individual payments or an updated number of affected creditors.

The new deadline is the fourth consecutive annual extension since the trustee initially aimed to complete distributions by October 2023. The deadline was later moved to October 2024, October 2025, October 2026 and now October 2027.

Mt. Gox began distributing Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash through designated cryptocurrency exchanges, including Kraken and Bitstamp, in July 2024. More than 19,500 creditors had received the two cryptocurrencies by March 2025, according to an earlier trustee announcement.

Further transfers require creditors to complete account verification, correct creditor information, arrange acceptance through designated exchanges and pass security checks. The process requires coordination among claimants, the trustee and the exchanges, which can delay payments after creditors submit their repayment details.

Mt. Gox collapsed in February 2014 after reporting the loss of about 850,000 Bitcoin. The Tokyo-based exchange had handled a substantial share of global Bitcoin trading, leaving thousands of customers to seek compensation through Japanese insolvency proceedings.

The exchange later entered civil rehabilitation, creating a process to return recovered assets to eligible creditors. Depending on the arrangement, creditors receive Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash through designated exchanges or cash proceeds from cryptocurrency sales.

Kobayashi directed creditors seeking information about unpaid claims to the official rehabilitation claims system. He advised them to log in before contacting the trustee to help verify their identities. Requests submitted outside the system may be harder to process, and a high volume of inquiries could delay responses.