Upbit lists Concrete (CT) in Korean won market, first-session turnover hits 49.8 billion won

Upbit, the South Korean crypto exchange, opened trading in Concrete (CT) on its Korean won (KRW), bitcoin (BTC) and Tether (USDT) markets at 6 p.m. KST on Oct. 19. The first trade on Upbit printed at 6:05 p.m. at 484 won, and the price climbed to 537 won within the hour. At 12:30 p.m. KST on Oct. 20, CT traded at 453 won on Upbit, more than 15% below that peak.

85 minutes from notice to first trade

Upbit posted its new listing notice at 4:40 p.m. KST on Oct. 19. The notice put CT's latest price at 400.21 won as of 4:25 p.m. and the previous day's close at 412.82 won. Prices on overseas exchanges moved sharply right after the notice.

1. Sept. 30, 19:00OKX opens CT/USDT spot trading (KST, after a one-hour call auction)
2. Oct. 19, 16:40Upbit posts the Concrete listing notice; deposits to open within an hour of the notice
3. Oct. 19, 16:00 hourCT on OKX rises 46%, from the prior hour's close of $0.3027 to a high of $0.4436
4. Oct. 19, 18:05First trade on Upbit's won market at 484 won; first-minute high of 530 won
5. Oct. 19, 19:00 hourUpbit peak of 537 won; Bithumb's won market begins trading (open 398 won, high 526 won)
6. Oct. 20, 12:30Upbit 453 won, Bithumb 450 won

Turnover in Upbit's won market from 6:05 p.m. on Oct. 19 to 9 a.m. on Oct. 20 came to about 49.8 billion won. As of midday Oct. 20, 24-hour turnover stood at about 58.8 billion won. Trading in Upbit's BTC and USDT markets was far smaller than in the won market.

No buying for the first five minutes

Upbit placed trading restrictions on the new listing to keep prices from spiking right after launch. Reference prices were set using CoinMarketCap data.

• Buy orders restricted for about five minutes after trading opened
• During the same five minutes, sell orders more than 10% below the previous day's close restricted
• For about two hours after trading opened, all orders other than limit orders (market orders and others) restricted

The buy restriction is why Upbit's one-minute chart shows no trades before 6:05 p.m. Deposits and withdrawals are supported only on the Ethereum network, and the notice listed the contract address as 0x0a09…7f46. CT sent over other networks will not be credited. The per-withdrawal limit will be set at the amount equal to 100 million won on the 20th business day counted from the business day after trading opened. Under the travel rule, deposits from exchanges not linked with Upbit or from personal wallets that have not completed ownership verification will also not be credited.

Concrete runs DeFi vaults

In its notice, Upbit described Concrete as an on-chain asset management infrastructure project that supports strategy design, asset allocation, yield management and risk control for digital assets. The protocol spreads assets deposited by users across multiple decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols to generate yield and automates the process through smart contracts. CT is used for governance voting and staking.

According to Concrete's developer documentation, users deposit assets into vaults and receive share tokens such as ctWBTC. Yield accrues through a rising exchange rate rather than a growing token count. These share tokens are separate from the CT token traded on exchanges. CT's total supply recorded on the Ethereum blockchain is 1 billion tokens.

CT began trading on Sept. 30 on overseas exchanges including OKX. In its listing notice, OKX described Concrete as "an institutional-grade on-chain asset management platform." According to CoinGecko, CT's all-time high was $0.619 on Oct. 2. It currently also trades on Coinbase, Kraken, KuCoin and Gate, among others, but is not listed on Binance's spot market.

Off its 537-won peak, kimchi premium at 0.8%

At 12:30 p.m. KST on Oct. 20, CT traded at 453 won on Upbit's won market and 450 won on Bithumb. At the same time, OKX quoted $0.3377, about 12% above the roughly $0.30 level before Upbit's notice (before the 4 p.m. hour). Converted at the exchange rate used in Coinyong's price feed (about 1,331 won per dollar), that is about 449 won, putting the kimchi premium (the gap between prices on Korean exchanges and global markets) at about 0.8% on Upbit.

Funding rates in OKX's perpetual futures market are negative. Funding is a payment exchanged between longs and shorts to keep futures prices in line with spot, and when it is negative, short positions pay long positions. OKX's CT funding rate, settled every two hours, was -0.20% for the 11 a.m. KST settlement on Oct. 20. Upbit's midday price on Oct. 20 was 13% above the 400.21-won latest price cited in its notice.