The digital asset market has cooled as Bitcoin’s sluggish sideways trend persists. December saw a sharp decline in coin listings on domestic exchanges, following a quarter with many new coins and a marked reduction this month. A Mail Business review of Korea’s top five digital asset exchanges (Upbit, Bithumb, Coinone, Cobbit, and GoFax) found 25 coins listed in the month, with Bithumb listing 10 and Upbit listing two. Upbit has not been listed for a while since it suffered a hacking incident on the 27th of last month.
Another peculiarity is that Gopax, which only listed a total of 22 this year, sold about half of them, or nine, in November and December. Gopax has been actively listed since November, when the acquisition of Binance was completed. Coin listings on local exchanges plunged 60.93 percent in December, compared with 64 listed in September. This is because Bitcoin’s slump is getting longer.
Bitcoin has been moving between $85,000 and $93,000 for more than a month after plunging to the early $80,000 range on the 21st of last month. Domestic and foreign stock markets continued their “Santa Rally” before and after Christmas, but the digital asset market was marginalized. The outlook is mixed, with some analysts warning of further downside and others optimistic about capital inflows. “Bitcoin could be pushed to $58,000,” said Peter Brandt, while Ark Invest CEO Cathy Wood said, “Bitcoin will surpass gold next year,” adding that there is room for funds to flow as institutions have only dipped their feet in the digital asset market.
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