Koreans Go Full Monty on DOGE, XRP, XLM After Trump's Win; Now Look to SAND Token

If you think the Terra/Luna crash of 2022 left lasting scars on the South Korean crypto community, you are wrong. With the bitcoin BTC$90,469.92 bull market in full swing, Koreans are again diving in head first and snapping up smaller cryptocurrencies.

Trading volume on South Korea's largest exchange, Upbit, which accounts for over 70% of the country's total activity, has skyrocketed 11-fold to $14.3 billion since the Nov. 5 U.S. presidential election that saw pro-crypto candidate Donald Trump emerge victorious, according to data source Coingecko.

Driving this exceptional volume growth are XRP, DOGE$0.1433 and other smaller tokens, pointing to a resurgence of retail investor mania.

For instance, the DOGE/KRW pair, which represents dogecoin's price in South Korean won, has been the most traded pair on Upbit for a total of 10 days, according to 10x Research. The XRP/KRW pair has been top six times and the XLM/KRW pair has been the most traded pair of the past 24 hours, accounting for 19% of the total volume Sunday.

The three tokens have skyrocketed by 164%, 188% and 463%, respectively, this month, though they remain below their respective record highs reached in 2021. Meanwhile, market leader bitcoin is trading at lifetime peaks near $100,000, representing a near 40% price gain, according to CoinDesk data.

"Since the Nov. 5 Trump election, bitcoin's dominance as the crypto with the highest volume has been replaced by altcoins, such as Doge, Ripple, and Stellar (XLM 19% market share on UPbit on Sunday, number 1 coin traded). Those are the ones with +100% returns, and while simply monitoring those changes in activity would have resulted in a lot of alpha, as we have frequently pointed out," Markus Thielen, founder of 10x Research, said in a note to clients Monday.

Koreans' love for cheaper plays is now extending to other crypto market sectors, including metaverse tokens like SAND, which are seeing a meaningful rally for the first in three years.

At press time, the SAND/KRW pair listed on Upbit boasted a 24-hour trading volume of $2 billion, or 14% of the exchange's total trading volume of $14.10 billion.

The SAND token has rallied over 200% to 76 cents this month, yet it remains well below its November 2021 peak of $8.49. Traders should keep a close eye on the surge in the metaverse and gaming tokens, as the last time these assets rallied, it marked the peak of the bull market in late 2021.