Korean crypto stocks on upward trend as Bitcoin, Ether prices soar

With the recent surge in the prices of digital assets such as Bitcoin and Ethereum, those of related stocks were also on the rise in the South Korean stock market on Friday.

On the secondary Kosdaq market, Woori Technology Investment Co. was trading at 5,300 won on Friday at 9:15 in the morning, up 7.51 percent from the previous trading day, and Wizit Co. at 950 won, up 3.26 percent.

Woori Technology Investment is categorized as a crypto stock due to its stake in Dunamu Inc., the operator of virtual currency exchange Upbit, while Wizit is known as a stock related to cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb.

The price of Bitcoin was trading at $36,668 at a similar time, up 2.86 percent from 24 hours earlier, according to crypto data tracker CoinMarketCap, surpassing the $37,000 mark earlier in the day and returning the level it saw prior to the failure of stablecoin TerraUSD (UST), which triggered a chain reaction in the cryptocurrency market in 2022.

Meanwhile, following a report that BlackRock Inc., one of the world‘s largest asset managers, filed for approval of an Ethereum spot exchange-traded fund (ETF) from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Thursday local time, the Ethereum price soared to $2,125, up 12.69 percent from 24 hours earlier.

Bitcoin and Ethereum, the first and second largest digital assets by market cap respectively, are going through a price surge as they await the SEC’s spot ETF approval.