Korean Crypto Exchanges See Sharp Decline in User Activity

The crypto market in South Korea has seen a significant decline in investor activity, with the share of users actively trading on major exchanges falling below 20%. According to data from the Financial Supervisory Service and analyzed by Lee Jong-wook, a lawmaker on the National Assembly's Strategy and Finance Committee, the active-user ratio at the country's five largest exchanges stood at 19.5% at the end of June.

This is a sharp drop from January 2025, when the active-user ratio was 35.7%. The number of new user inflows has also slowed, with the number of KYC-verified users eligible to trade reaching a record 11,563,661 at the end of March and falling to 11,153,038 by the end of June.

The industry attributes this decline in interest to the increased appeal of domestic and overseas stock markets, including shares such as Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix. The value of South Korean investors' crypto holdings also shrank, decreasing by 54.7% from January 2025 to June, with exchange deposits falling by over $7 billion.