USDT/KRW premium live · Kimchi premium · South Korea

Mid% = kimchi-style premium: + means USDT is dearer locally than official FX implies. 1H = median premium, last hour.

Median mid premium per currency. Click a tile, or type its code, for the currency page.

Commands

Type anywhere to reach the command line. Keys 1–7 switch functions, / jumps to the filter, Esc goes back.

What it measures

premium(ccy, venue) = USDT price in ccy / official ccy-per-USD − 1

The kimchi premium (Upbit KRW-USDT vs the won rate) applied to every currency with a USDT market: exchange order books where they exist, Binance P2P for the rest (about 85 fiats).

Forward cycle · USDT at a premium

USD → buy USDT on a US venue (ask) → send → sell locally (bid) → local fiat
 ▲                                                                   │
 └──────── remittance partner wires it back at FX mid − remit cost ◀──┘

Reverse cycle · USDT at a discount

USD → remit to local fiat → buy USDT locally (ask) → send → sell on a US venue (bid) → USD

Columns

Premium% / Discount%: Gross edge of the local price against the USD price of USDT, before any fee.
Net% · Net $: What the cycle returns on the notional after every cost in the panel.
BE remit%: The most your remittance partner can charge, all-in, for the cycle to break even.

Caveats

Top of book only. A $100k sale moves thin books; depth is not modelled.
The remittance leg is priced at the official daily mid minus your cost assumption, not a live partner quote.
Not modelled: settlement time, KYC and outbound limits, capital controls, tax.
Where a parallel FX market exists, the premium mostly measures that gap, not an arbitrage.
P2P quotes depend on payment method and size; books wider than the spread limit are dropped.

USDT/KRW premium: Tether in South Korean won, South Korea (Kimchi premium)

Live price of USDT in South Korean won against the official KRW rate. The panel above shows the median premium across venues, its last hour, every venue's bid and ask, and a leg-by-leg breakdown of the round trip from US dollars through South Korea and back, with the cost model you set on the left.

The kimchi premium is the gap between crypto prices on Korean won exchanges such as Upbit and Bithumb and the rest of the world. Korean exchanges are open only to local, verified accounts and moving won abroad is restricted, so the gap can stay open for long periods.

Questions about USDT/KRW

What is the USDT premium in South Korea?

It is the price of one USDT in South Korean won divided by the official KRW per US dollar rate, minus one. arbmonitor computes it for each venue that quotes USDT/KRW and shows the median across venues, updated live.

Where is USDT/KRW quoted?

arbmonitor currently reads USDT/KRW prices from Bithumb, Coinone and Korbit.

Why can USDT trade away from the official KRW rate?

Local demand for dollars, limits on buying foreign currency, banking frictions and the cost and speed of moving money in and out of South Korea all keep local USDT prices apart from the official rate. Where a parallel exchange rate exists, the premium mostly measures that gap.

How is the KRW round trip calculated?

Forward: dollars buy USDT on a US venue, the USDT is sold for South Korean won at the local bid, and the KRW is wired back at the official mid rate minus the remittance cost. Reverse: dollars are wired to South Korea, converted at the mid rate, used to buy USDT at the local ask, and the USDT is sold for dollars in the US. Fees, the USDT network fee and a flat wire fee are deducted at each step.