As Kospi Dips, 9 in 10 'Big Hands' on Overseas Crypto Exchanges Bet on Rebound

Trading of high-leverage futures products related to the South Korean stock market listed on overseas virtual asset exchanges has recently increased steeply.

Notably, as the domestic stock market turned weak, "big hands" on virtual asset exchanges have collectively bet on a stock price rebound through futures investments.

According to the virtual asset exchange Binance today (the 17th), as of 9:00 a.m. the previous day, the open interest for "KORUUSDT," a perpetual futures contract of the exchange-traded fund (ETF) KORU tracking the "MSCI Korea 25/50" index with 3x leverage, and "SKHYNIXUSDT," based on SK Hynix stock prices, recorded 9,925,555 and 562,673, respectively, reaching their highest levels in a month.

Open interest refers to futures contracts that investors have entered into to bet on an increase (long) or decrease (short) but have not yet liquidated.

An increase in this open interest is interpreted as more active market participation and capital inflow.

Converted into monetary value, KORUUSDT amounted to 115.83 million Tether (USDT), and SKHYNIXUSDT to 546.22 million USDT.

Applying the USDT price of 1,348 won from the previous day, these figures reach approximately 156.1 billion won and 736.3 billion won, respectively.

The open interest for KORUUSDT had hovered between 2 million and 3.7 million contracts over the past month, with a scale of 41 million to 67 million USDT, but surged sharply starting on the 13th when the Kospi turned bearish.

Similarly, SKHYNIXUSDT recorded 250,000 to 280,000 contracts and a scale of 300 million to 370 million USDT over the past month before increasing around the same time.

"SAMSUNGUSDT," which tracks Samsung Electronics, also recorded an open interest of 226,635 contracts with a scale of 36.47 million USDT as of the previous day, its highest since September 29.

Trading volumes were also among the top ranks.

During the previous trading session, the intraday trading volumes for SKHYNIXUSDT and KORUUSDT reached approximately 2.3 billion USDT and 1.5 billion USDT, respectively, ranking second and fifth in Binance's overall futures market.

SAMSUNGUSDT also entered the top 20 with about 220 million USDT.

In particular, it is noteworthy that most large-scale investors have bet on a rebound in the domestic stock market.

Looking at user accounts in the top 20% based on Binance margin balances, the proportion of accounts holding long positions in KORUUSDT the previous day was 91.24%, while those holding short positions stood at 8.76%.

This means that fewer than 1 in 10 big hands put money into the prospect of a further decline in major domestic indexes.

For SKHYNIXUSDT, accounts holding long positions accounted for 92.53%, and short positions 7.47%.

While the ratio of long and short positions for KORUUSDT was mixed earlier this month, long positions surged sharply after the 13th.

Long positions for SKHYNIXUSDT also hovered in the 60% range at the beginning of the month before exceeding 90% starting on the 14th.

SAMSUNGUSDT also recorded a long position ratio of 85.69% the previous day, marking a monthly high.

Amid mixed forecasts regarding the direction of the domestic stock market, optimism appears to dominate the overseas perpetual futures market.

Typically, investors trading perpetual futures on platforms like Binance aim for high returns by applying leverage of up to 50 times to the movement of the underlying asset.

In response, financial authorities stated the previous day that they are issuing a warning, noting that perpetual futures carry the risk of losing the entire investment principal due to high leverage and lack protection under domestic law.

(Photo: Yonhap News)
※ Please note: This article was translated by AI and may contain errors.