Last year, the cryptocurrency market surged and several KOSDAQ-listed firms that invested in digital assets rode the rally; however, they have since fallen as the market collapsed. Parataxis Korea (288330) closed down 5.81% at 860 won, after peaking at 3,415 won in July of last year, and has dropped 18.79% this month. The company, which originally listed as a pharmaceutical and biotech firm in 2019, established a digital assets division last year and moved into cryptocurrency investing.
As of the end of the third quarter, Parataxis Korea held 136.4 BTC (acquisition cost 22.5 billion won), with an average cost per BTC of about 164.71 million won; BTC traded around 94.93 million won per coin at 4 p.m. on the CoinMarketApp, reflecting an impairment of roughly 42.3%. The company had accumulated operating losses of 13.1 billion won as of Q3 and, in December last year, borrowed 15.3 billion won using BTC as collateral at an 11% annual rate.
Apptun (270520), a brain disease treatment developer, added cryptocurrency ecosystem development to its business purpose in July last year and began accumulating BTC and ETH. As of the end of Q3, Apptun held 60.25 BTC (acquisition cost 9.6 billion won), with a per-BTC cost of about 159.93 million won. The stock has fallen 74% since July last year.
BitMax (377030), once regarded as the ‘Korean version of Strategy’ for its BTC holdings, adopted a Digital Asset Treasury (DAT) strategy benchmarking a U.S. IT firm and holds the largest BTC stake among domestic listings. As of the end of Q3, BitMax held 551.238 BTC (acquisition cost 81.0 billion won), with a per-BTC cost of about 146.86 million won. BitMax posted 12.0 billion won in operating profit through the third quarter, but its shares fell 6.05% on the day. An industry executive cautioned that further declines in crypto prices could make the financial health shown on the balance sheet worse than actual operations, urging caution in stock picking.
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