Kimchi Premium Tracker

Track the Kimchi Premium — the price difference between Korean crypto exchanges (Upbit, Bithumb) and global exchanges (Binance) — in real time.

What is the Kimchi Premium?

The Kimchi Premium refers to the phenomenon where cryptocurrency prices on South Korean exchanges trade at a premium (or sometimes discount) compared to global exchanges. This premium is driven by capital controls, high domestic demand, and limited arbitrage pathways.

Features

• 200+ tokens tracked — auto-detects all KRW-listed coins on Upbit
• Real-time price comparison across Upbit, Bithumb, and Binance
• Premium calculation with automatic USD/KRW exchange rate conversion
• Reverse premium detection — alerts when Korean prices dip below global prices
• Upbit-Bithumb spread — compare prices between Korean exchanges
• Threshold filtering — only show tokens above a certain premium %
• Sorting options — by premium (high/low) or alphabetically
• Fallback price sources — CoinGecko backup if Binance is unavailable

Input

Field	Type	Default	Description
autoDetectAll	boolean	true	Track all KRW-listed coins on Upbit (~240 tokens)
symbols	string[]	[]	Specific tokens to track (only used when autoDetectAll is off)
includeUpbit	boolean	true	Include Upbit exchange
includeBithumb	boolean	true	Include Bithumb exchange
premiumThreshold	number	0	Minimum absolute premium % to include
sortBy	string	premium_desc	Sort: premium_desc, premium_asc, symbol_asc

Output

Each result in the dataset contains:

Field	Description
symbol	Token symbol (e.g., BTC)
binance_usdt	Binance USDT price
binance_krw_equivalent	Binance price converted to KRW
upbit_krw	Upbit KRW price
upbit_premium_pct	Upbit premium percentage
bithumb_krw	Bithumb KRW price
bithumb_premium_pct	Bithumb premium percentage
upbit_bithumb_spread_pct	Price difference between Upbit and Bithumb
usd_krw_rate	Exchange rate used
timestamp	UTC timestamp

A SUMMARY key-value record is also saved with aggregate stats (average premium, top tokens, etc.).

Pricing

This Actor uses Pay-Per-Event (PPE) pricing:

• $0.003 per token tracked (e.g., default full scan of ~200 tokens ≈ $0.60 per run)

Use Cases

• Arbitrage monitoring — spot premium spikes for arbitrage opportunities
• Market sentiment — Kimchi Premium is a popular indicator of Korean retail FOMO
• Research & analytics — track historical premium trends
• Trading signals — combine with other indicators for entry/exit decisions

Example Output

{
    "symbol": "BTC",
    "binance_usdt": 67500.00,
    "binance_krw_equivalent": 92340000,
    "upbit_krw": 95200000,
    "upbit_premium_pct": 3.10,
    "upbit_is_reverse": false,
    "bithumb_krw": 95050000,
    "bithumb_premium_pct": 2.94,
    "bithumb_is_reverse": false,
    "upbit_bithumb_spread_pct": 0.16,
    "usd_krw_rate": 1368.0,
    "timestamp": "2026-03-28T23:00:00+00:00"
}

Notes

• All exchange APIs are public (no API key required)
• Exchange rate sourced from open.er-api.com with fallback to exchangerate-api.com
• Rate limits are respected automatically
• Prices are snapshot at the time of the run (not streaming)
• Bithumb may be unavailable during maintenance hours (KST 01:00-08:00)
• Tokens with unrealistic premiums (>15%) are filtered as likely symbol mismatches

Disclaimer

This Actor is unofficial and not affiliated with Upbit, Bithumb, or Binance. Data is provided as-is for informational purposes.