While Bitcoin was winking at its new ATH, $ 68,000 was exceeded last night. While expectations are gathering at the point of exceeding $69,000 in a very short time, ATH has already been exceeded on Upbit, South Korea's largest cryptocurrency exchange.
According to the post of Chinese journalist Wu Blockchain, Bitcoin hit 96,530,000 won, or $72,000, on Upbit on March 5. This 6% difference between the BTC price on exchanges such as Binance and Coinbase and Upbit was attributed to the kimchi premium.
The kimchi premium manifested itself not only in the BTC price but also in the Ethereum (ETH) price. According to this,
“South Korea's largest exchange, Upbit, has a “kimchi bonus” for BTC and ETH trading pairs.
The current price of BTC/KRW on Upbit is around 96.35 million Korean won, or around $72,000, with a 6% kimchi premium on the price difference.
While the ETH price ETH/KRW reached approximately 5.28 million Korean won, $3,956, it was observed that there was a 7% kimchi premium on the ETH price difference.”
What is Kimchi Bonus?
Kimchi premium; It represents the spread between the Bitcoin price on South Korean exchanges and the Bitcoin price on global exchanges such as Binance and Coinbase.
According to the University of Calgary, the kimchi prime was first seen in early 2016.
Although it brought a decrease in BTC price after similar increases in kimchi premium in recent years, this data is not 100 percent proven data.
At this point, experts commenting on the increase in kimchi premium stated that this increase in kimchi premium is related to the increasing purchasing demand of South Korean investors, and that BTC has an important catalyst such as halving.
*This is not investment advice.