Nexon announced on April 28 that Nexon Japan bought 1,717 Bitcoins by investing US$100 million. “The average purchase price is US$58,226 and the total purchase is less than 2 percent of Nexon’s cash and cash equivalents,” it explained.At present, Nexon is in control of Nexon Japan via NXC, an unlist
Bitcoin arbitrage to take advantage of the so-called kimchi premium and related overseas remittance are increasing rapidly. Under the circumstances, South Korean banks have begun to take measures.For instance, on April 19, Woori Bank began to apply a maximum remittance of US$10,000 a month to its Un
The virtual currency trading volume is skyrocketing and concerns are being expressed over a lack of regulations. Under the circumstances, the South Korean government recently began to work on guidelines.CoinMarketCap announced that the trading volumes for the latest 24 hours of the 14 exchanges that
An increasing number of Chinese are requesting overseas remittance via South Korean banks and the banks are suspecting that the requests are for illegal foreign exchange transactions related to Bitcoin.“Most of those Chinese request a remittance of US$50,000, the annual individual remittance limit,
The so-called kimchi premium is reappearing as the domestic virtual asset market is heating up.As of 16:00 March 25, the bitcoin price on Binance was approximately 60.1 million won and that on UPbit was 64.8 million won, which means a premium of about 8 percent. The premium was 7.9 percent, 8 percen
Korea Investment & Securities said in its report on March 18 that established financial systems are increasingly considering embracing virtual assets with the trading of such assets increasing worldwide and Bitcoin becoming more and more likely to act as the center of the ecosystem of such assets.“I
The market capitalization of virtual currencies listed on domestic exchanges increased approximately 10-fold in three years, led by Bitcoin.According to industry sources, the overall market index on the UPbit exchange was 9,742.62 points at 5:45 p.m., March 15. The starting index on Oct. 1, 2017 had
The author is an analyst of KB Securities. He can be reached at jeff.kim@kbfg.com. -- Ed. Raise target price by 12% to KRW190,000; DRAM/NAND ASP growth estimates bumped up We maintain BUY and raise our 12m TP by 12% to KRW190,000 (12m fwd BVPS x 2.2x target P/B) for SK hynix to accommodate upward re
The won-based Bitcoin trading volume at the top two domestic cryptocurrency exchanges increased approximately 10-fold in just one year.Specifically, the trading volume at UPbit, which had been 1,627.9 billion won in January 2020 and less than three trillion won until October, jumped to 3,921.9 billi
Bank of Korea Governor Lee Ju-yeol remarked on Feb. 23 that the central bank almost finished the design and technical study of its central bank digital currency (CBDC).A CBDC is similar to Bitcoin in that it is a digital currency. However, they differ from each other in that the former is issued by
The South Korean government has decided to impose a tax on an annual cryptocurrency trading profit of 2.5 million won or more. The measure will be implemented next year.In the global cryptocurrency market, the Bitcoin price is moving around US$50,000 after having jumped about 70 percent in six weeks
Shinhan Bank announced on Jan. 28 that it has signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with BitGo, a U.S. digital asset financial services company, and Korea Digital Asset Custody (KDAC) to establish a cooperative system in the digital asset sector."We signed the MOU to expand our global virtual a
Blockchain and fintech firm Dunamu announced on Nov. 24 that the 24-hour trading volume of digital asset exchange UPbit topped 1.7 trillion won.At 10:00 a.m. that day, UPbit recorded a 24-hour trading volume of US$1,536,357,938 on CoinMarketCap to become the fifth-largest digital asset exchange in t
Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics are increasing their participation in the blockchain and virtual asset industries.Samsung Electronics recently formed a partnership with virtual asset exchange Gemini in order to provide Galaxy smartphone-based virtual asset trading services in the United State
Samsung Electronics has chosen blockchain technology as one of its future growth engines. The tech giant has officially launched the Blockchain Development Group by putting together researchers who have been working on blockchain development at various departments of its wireless business division.T
The year of 2020 will be the first year of a U.S.-China digital finance war based on blockchain and cryptocurrency technology, SK Securities said in a recent report. The brokerage says that the two countries are stepping up efforts to preoccupy techfin using blockchain technology.“The United States
Naver's Japanese subsidiary LINE is accelerating the expansion of its new financial business. Following Singapore, LINE opened a cryptocurrency exchange in the United States.LINE announced on Feb. 25 that it has opened “Bitfront,” an exchange where people can trade cryptocurrencies with U.S. dol
Malta-based cryptocurrency exchange Binance announced on Feb. 16 that it has opened cryptocurrency purchase services based on the 15 currencies including the South Korean won. Market watchers say Binance’s South Korean market penetration is likely to take shape based on the new service.The other cur
The 4th Industrial Revolution Commission under the Presidential Office suggested that the Korean government allow financial institutions to launch cryptocurrency-related products, such as Bitcoin derivatives, as a medium- and long-term strategy for the institutionalization of cryptocurrencies.As dig
The Supreme Court of South Korea acknowledged the economic value of cryptocurrencies for the first time in May last year. At that time, the court ruled that the Bitcoin is an intangible asset, implying that cryptocurrencies are subject to taxation.Earlier, from December 2013 to April 2017, a South K