Three Samsung affiliates are acquiring a combined 4% stake in the company behind Upbit, valuing it at 15.3 trillion won.
Samsung is buying its way into crypto’s most active retail market. Three Samsung affiliates have agreed to acquire a 4% stake in Dunamu, the parent company of South Korea’s largest cryptocurrency exchange Upbit, for approximately $408 million.
The deal involves Samsung Securities, Samsung SDS, and Samsung Card purchasing a combined 1.39 million shares from a Kakao affiliate. That price tag values Dunamu at roughly 15.3 trillion won.
How the stake breaks down
Samsung Securities is taking the largest slice at 2%, with Samsung SDS and Samsung Card each picking up 1%. The total cost across all three entities comes to about 612.8 billion won.
Upbit consistently ranks as South Korea’s dominant crypto exchange by trading volume and holds a position among the top exchanges globally.
The shares are being purchased from a Kakao affiliate, which means Kakao is trimming its position in Dunamu. Kakao, the company behind South Korea’s ubiquitous messaging app KakaoTalk, has been an early backer of Dunamu since Upbit’s founding.
Samsung’s crypto history and the institutional wave
This isn’t Samsung’s first contact with digital assets. The company has previously integrated cryptocurrency wallet features into its Galaxy smartphones and offered Bitcoin futures ETF products through its financial arms.
The investment follows recent stake purchases in Dunamu by Hana Bank and Hanwha, two other heavyweight Korean financial institutions.
There is also growing speculation that these institutional stake acquisitions could be laying the groundwork for an eventual Dunamu IPO.
What this means for investors
The competitive implications are also worth watching. Bithumb, Korea’s second-largest exchange, and other smaller platforms now face an Upbit parent company backed by some of the country’s most powerful corporate names.
South Korea’s crypto market is already heavily tilted toward Upbit in terms of volume. Adding Samsung’s ecosystem, which touches everything from smartphones to insurance to payment cards, could entrench that dominance further.
