SEOUL/MUMBAI, March 5 (Reuters) – Bitcoin’s runaway rally is being driven by investors in Asia.
Traders in South Korea, China and other Asian countries are responsible for roughly 70% of bitcoin trading volumes, much like they were in 2021 when bitcoin last hit such heady highs, according to crypto exchange data from The Block.
Asia accounted for $791 billion of the $1.17 trillion worth of bitcoin traded in February, with North American investors lagging way behind with $113 billion, broadly reflecting a trend seen since November, the data shows.
In China, FOMO has gripped many small investors frustrated with an anaemic stock market. On popular messaging app WeChat, searches for “bitcoin” jumped 12-fold in February.
“I want to buy some bitcoin at a good price and hold,” Mia Wang, a finance industry employee based in China’s eastern province of Zhejiang, told Reuters. “It has jumped a lot and is expensive now, but I worry it won’t have any correction.”
Bitcoin is trading at around $65,000 – close to its record of $69,000 – after an eye-popping 148% rise since early October, primarily driven by U.S. regulators approving spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs). BlackRock’s iShares bitcoin trust (IBIT.O), opens new tab has been a major beneficiary of such investment flows.
Traders have also poured into the world’s biggest cryptocurrency ahead of April’s “halving” event, which could reduce supply and push prices up. Supply of bitcoin is limited to 21 million, of which 19 million tokens have already been mined.
