[Special Stock] Bident, Bitcoin Recovery Trend... Expectation of Bithumb Performance Improvement

[Asia Economy Reporter Hyungsoo Park] Bident is showing strong performance. As the price of Bitcoin maintains an upward trend, expectations for the cryptocurrency exchange's earnings are increasing.

At 2:10 PM on the 29th, Bident was trading at 14,300 KRW, up 16.73% from the previous day.

El Salvador, which adopted Bitcoin as legal tender, purchased an additional 420 Bitcoins for 25 million USD (approximately 29.27 billion KRW). It now holds a total of 1,120 Bitcoins. The Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) listed on the U.S. stock market is also gaining popularity, and after a slight dip to 70 million KRW on the 27th, the Bitcoin price has recovered by surpassing 74 million KRW.

Bident, a broadcasting display specialist company, is the single largest shareholder of the cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb, holding 10.25% of Bithumb Korea, the operator of Bithumb, and 34.22% of the holding company Bithumb Holdings. Bithumb recorded a cumulative net profit of 603.3 billion KRW in the first half of this year, an increase of 1100% compared to 50.1 billion KRW in the same period last year. Bident, as an investor, also saw its net profit rise approximately 1084% to 137.4 billion KRW in the first half, compared to 11.2 billion KRW in the previous year.

Domestic investors have net purchased more than 40 billion KRW worth of Bitcoin-related ETFs listed on the U.S. stock market within a week. According to the Korea Securities Depository, from the 19th to the 26th, domestic investors bought 37.06 million USD (approximately 43.4 billion KRW) worth of the Bitcoin-related ETF 'PROSHARES BITCOIN STRATEGY ETF' (BITO).

BITO is an ETF listed on the New York Stock Exchange on the 19th by ProShares, a U.S. ETF specialist asset manager. On its first day of listing, the trading volume was 980 million USD, ranking second highest in history for first-day ETF trading volume.