Tom Lee flags Korea equity rout as crypto risk factor
Macro & Markets ·
BitMine's Tom Lee says a steep South Korean stock slide could spill into digital assets through margin calls, as bitcoin's recent dip and heavy liquidations already show signs of strain.
South Korea's KOSPI index shed more than 15% over five days, a drop steep enough to prompt the Korea Exchange to briefly halt program trading, according to CryptoPotato. Samsung and SK Hynix, which together make up roughly half the index, led the decline. Tom Lee argued the damage in Korean equities could extend into crypto markets, pointing to two transmission channels: brokerage margin liquidations forcing investors to raise cash, and the outsized presence of Korean holders in digital-asset markets.
Bitcoin's own price action had already softened before the warning. The token touched an 18-day low near $80,000 late last week, rebounded toward $83,000 over the weekend, and was turned back at $84,000 on Monday before slipping again to roughly $81,000. Leverage across crypto markets came under pressure in parallel, with about $810 million in positions wiped out over 24 hours, close to 85% of it long bets on higher prices, affecting 173,611 traders.
The equity slide was not confined to Korea. Nasdaq 100 futures were down about 1% in overnight trading, suggesting the selling pressure extended beyond a single regional market. A separate account of the session put the KOSPI's single-day decline at more than 6%, with technology shares driving the move, corroborating the broader pattern of a tech-led sell-off feeding into risk-asset sentiment generally.
Lee's remarks arrive as his firm, BitMine, continues building an ether position, having added 12,532 ETH in its latest weekly purchase, its third in a row, bringing its total holding to 6,028,946 ETH, equal to 4.9% of supply. He has indicated the accumulation is nearly complete, with about 100,000 ETH left to reach a 5% target.
What remains unclear is whether the margin-driven selling Lee described will materialize as a sustained outflow from crypto or stays confined to short-term volatility, as he himself framed it. Also unresolved is how durable bitcoin's bounce back toward $84,000 proves if Korean equities keep falling, and whether the liquidation pattern seen in the latest 24-hour window repeats if the KOSPI sell-off deepens further.