Kimchi Premium on Bitcoin & Ethereum Aiming for 15%

It was earlier this year that the cryptocurrency market started seeing the Korean premium make its reappearance, which was popular in 2017. As we have reported, the premium on both BTC and ETH has been uptrending.

The Kimchi premium on Bitcoin is currently making its way to 15%, the same as Ether ETH 0.64% Ethereum / USD ETHUSD $ 1,095.06
$7.010.64% Volume 18.28 b Change $7.01 Open $1,095.06 Circulating 121.36 m Market Cap 132.9 b 6 mon Coinbase Predicts Substantial Growth of Newer L1 Chains & Institutionalization of Regulated DeFi 6 mon A Possible Crypto Recovery Moving Into New Year, Risk-on Sentiments Send The Stock Market to Another Record High 6 mon The Sandbox Game Is Migrating to Ethereum Sidechain Polygon and Launching A DAO in 2022 and XRP XRP 1.66% XRP / USD XRPUSD $ 0.33
$0.011.66% Volume 1.52 b Change $0.01 Open $0.33 Circulating 48.34 b Market Cap 15.99 b 6 mon Bitcoin and Ether Breaks Trend With Outflows While Altcoins Continue to See Inflows 6 mon SBI Holdings to Launch Japan’s First Crypto Fund; Including BTC, ETH, DOT, LINK, LTC, XRP & BCH 6 mon Ledger Announces Integration with FTX and Coinbase, Launching Crypto Life Debit Card . Zhu Su, CEO at Three Arrows Capital said,

“Think folks are underestimating the reawakening of Korean demand for cryptoassets. Premiums are over 10% now but can easily go to 100% given that it's even harder to arbitrage than last time. This, in turn, creates a large feedback loop for overall prices.”

Source: CryptoQuant

While during the last bull run, South Koreans were much more involved in the crypto market, this time, the volume on Korean crypto exchanges is under 2% of the global crypto volume.

While they may not be matching up with their crypto counterparts, the crypto transaction rate in the country surged past the transaction rate of its national stock exchange last month. Ki-Young Ju, CEO of CryptoQuant noted,

“Korean government prohibits derivative trading in Korean exchanges, so the only way to get rich in the short term is to get a ride on shitcoin pumpings.”

One Twitter user noted that Koreans are busy with the regional coins this time as they didn’t ride the DeFi rally.

Korean crypto may not be undervalued, but it is certainly under acknowledged. People asked where are the Koreans this cycle? They're investing in their *own* protocols

30 day returns$LUNA 79.5%$MIR 38.4$$KLAY 252%$CTC 589%$BELT Just started

— HanSolar (@hansolar21) March 12, 2021

The government is also focused on blockchain technology and in a stimulus package last year, they focused on the “digital new deal.” From online voting systems to allocate welfare to low-income citizens, they are using blockchain technology for a number of initiatives.