SORAN is a quick digest of what Korean Telegram communities are talking about right now.
TOP STORY
Robinhood Chain Memecoin Boom, PONS Hits New ATH Daily
The room is completely focused on the Robinhood chain memecoin rally. PONS is consistently hitting all-time highs with a $360M market cap while dozens of other memecoins like ANALYST, FAFO, SAYLORMOON, and DRAW are running simultaneously, with new tokens like PAIR and FONE constantly emerging. Robinhood chain gas fees hit $550K daily, surpassing Binance, Bitcoin, and Ethereum to rank 4th overall—talk of 30x returns for early entrants is establishing the chain as a liquidity hub.
The community is watching whether major KOLs continue onboarding and high volume confirms Robinhood as the liquidity hub, and whether platform activity translates into sustained PONS buying and burning.
Korean Exchange Fee War Heats Up, New Players Go Zero-Fee
Mirae Asset's Digital X (Korbit) and Korea Investment Securities' Coinone are launching zero-fee offerings, shaking up the Upbit-Bithumb duopoly. Upbit fired back by cutting BTC/USDT trading fees by 80%, signaling the won-based trading landscape is being redrawn.
Base Chain Loses Memecoins, Pivots to RWA
Base memecoins are stagnating and moving out to Robinhood, with developer and trader interest fading. Meanwhile, Aerodrome has launched tokenized stock trading and hit $27M daily volume, signaling Base's pivot toward becoming an RWA hub.
Tria Hack Recovery Complete, Full Refund Plus 10% Bonus
Tria announced completion of full reimbursement to all affected users plus 10% additional compensation via Rain Card partnership. Community notes the swift response but the token price remains underwater at roughly 50% below previous levels. ↗ x.com
Russia's Sberbank Accepts Crypto as Loan Collateral
Russia's largest bank, Sberbank, is now officially accepting BTC, ETH, and USDT as loan collateral. The community interprets this as a major financial institution bringing crypto into the mainstream. ↗ x.com
Korean Politics and Macro Headwinds, Semiconductor Windfall Tax and Rate Warning
Following the nomination of Yong Hye-in as Minister of Gender Equality and Family, a semiconductor windfall tax is gaining traction as policy. Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix's corporate tax payments are up 167% year-over-year, fueling the windfall tax push. This compounds with Lee Jae-myung's warning of a 3.5% rate hike in Q1 next year. ↗ magazine.hankyung.com
Prediction Market Regulation Tightens, White House Insider Trading Caught
A White House teleprompter operator made $100K on Kalshi prediction market using advance speech information and was caught and fined $172K. The community sees this as a signal that regulators are cracking down on prediction markets. ↗ x.com
Copy Trading Exploited in Pump-and-Dump Scheme Warnings
Multiple communities are discussing allegations that muke (@celo33) pre-buys memecoins via a hidden wallet, promotes them via his main account to attract copy traders, then dumps the position. While unconfirmed, the pattern matches textbook pump-and-dump schemes and warrants caution.