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These Countries Were Hit The Hardest By the FTX Collapse – Find Out Why

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Sead Fadilpašić

Journalist

Sead Fadilpašić

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Sead specializes in writing factual and informative articles to help the public navigate the ever-changing world of crypto. He has extensive experience in the blockchain industry, where he has served...

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Last updated:

June 26, 2023

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South Korea, Singapore, and Japan are the three countries most impacted by crypto exchange FTX‘s infamous implosion, with a combined 15.7% traffic share to FTX.com, said a report by Coingecko.

The methodology of the study, as explained by Julia Ng, who leads Growth Marketing & PR at CoinGecko, included the examination of the monthly unique visitors and traffic share by country on FTX desktop and mobile web, and was based on SimilarWeb data from January to October 2022.

Based on this, the study published on Thursday found the top three most impacted countries in the world.

1. South Korea

South Korea was hit the hardest by FTX’s collapse. It saw the highest traffic share among all the countries worldwide, 6.1%, representing 297,229 unique users on average visiting FTX.com monthly, across desktop and mobile web, the report said.

It added that,

“The FTX fallout has propelled South Korea’s government officials to draw up the Digital Asset Basic Act, a comprehensive regulatory framework that is expected to be finalized next year.”

Notably, the eye of the South Korean regulators was already firmly fixed on the crypto industry following the massive collapse of the Terra / LUNA ecosystem this year. As reported yesterday, in the latest related news, officials confiscated over $100 million worth of funds belonging to Terraform Labs co-founder Shin Hyun-Seong (Daniel Shin).

2. Singapore

This country saw 5% of the traffic to FTX.com globally, or 241,675 monthly average unique users.

It is significant to note that Singapore is widely seen as Asia’s cryptocurrency hub. The report argued that,

“The shuttering of [crypto exchange] Binance in December 2021 saw Binance users in Singapore switching to FTX, and may explain why Singapore ranks high on the list of countries impacted by FTX’s demise.”

As the FTX collapse continued to ravage the crypto markets across the world, Singapore’s state-run fund Temasek decided to write down the $275 million investment made into the failed crypto exchange.

Meanwhile, Ethereum (ETH) co-founder Vitalik Buterin recently argued that the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) is enforcing a regulatory approach to crypto which he described as a “tough balance”. While he said he appreciated some of the regulator’s policy choices, he also stated that the MAS is at risk of following in the footsteps of many other regulators from across the world who view crypto as “weird and scary.”

3. Japan

Japan is in the third spot with 4.6% of traffic share, representing 223,513 unique users on average visiting FTX.com monthly.

The study noted that,

“Japanese investment giant, SoftBank, invested $100 million in FTX earlier this year alongside other backers like Lightspeed Venture Partners, Tiger Global, and Insight Partners.”

This announcement, says the report, followed a memo by the venture capital firm Sequoia to their limited partners, announcing FTX’s liquidity problems and dropping their investment to $0.

Just days ago, the Japanese Liquid exchange – which had been acquired by FTX this year – suspended withdrawals from its platform. Meanwhile, the Japanese government stated that it would do all it could to protect customers of FTX’s Japanese subsidiary, FTX Japan, while the exchange claimed that its clients’ funds are safe.

UK in the 12th spot, USA takes the 18th

Besides these three, the top 10 list of the most affected countries includes Russia, Germany, Turkey, Taiwan, India, Egypt, and Brazil.

The United Kingdom took the spot number 12, followed by Canada in the 15th. Not far behind is the USA, sitting in 18th place.

The three least affected by the FTX’s collapse among the top 30 countries are Mexico, Saudi Arabia, and Morocco.

Top 30 countries ranked by monthly unique visitors to FTX.com from January to October 2022:

As reported, FTX declared bankruptcy on November 11, following a swift and turbulent collapse of the exchange, and Sam Bankman-Fried resigned as CEO. Approximately 130 affiliated companies are also part of the Chapter 11 bankruptcy voluntary proceedings, including Alameda Research, the exchange’s parent company.

The Coingecko report also noted that, until the time of writing, FTX’s native token FTT’s market capitalization plummeted 76% by $2.9 billion, following the news of its liquidity crunch and Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao declaring the liquidation of its FTT holdings.

At 11:10 UTC on Monday morning, FTT was trading at $1.3, down 7.4% in a day, 13% in a week, and 94% in a month. Overall, it dropped nearly 98% in a year and more than 98% from its all-time high of $84.18 recorded in September last year.

FTT 30-day price chart: