The cooling of US inflation has boosted Bitcoin's surge, and South Korea's crypto market activity has reached a record high

Bitcoin prices performed strongly amid a stock market rally on Wednesday after the U.S. Consumer Price Index (CPI) for April showed inflation slowing from the previous month. Bitcoin prices jumped more than 7% to $66,124.59, marking their best day since March 25 and breaking above their 50-day moving average for the first time since April 13, according to Coin Metrics. However, long before the global cryptocurrency boom pushed prices to record highs in early 2024, South Korean retail investors were pouring into current digital asset exchanges.

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The number of active users of registered exchanges in South Korea increased by 390,000 to a total of 6.45 million by the end of 2023, accounting for more than 10% of the country's total population, according to the semi-annual report of the Korea Financial Intelligence Service (KOFIU). Of these, 99% are individual investors and nearly 60% are between 30 and 40 years old. During this time, South Korea's average daily cryptocurrency trading volume increased by 24% to 3.6 trillion won (about $2.6 billion), while the total value of cryptocurrencies held by registered exchanges soared by 53% to 43.6 trillion won.

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It is worth mentioning that despite the collapse of TerraUSD, a stablecoin created by Korean Do Kwon in 2022, South Korea's enthusiasm for cryptocurrency has not diminished. A major political party promised in last month's parliamentary election that it would allow South Koreans to use the US Bitcoin ETF.