CEO of Upbit Parent Dunamu Says Exchange Eyeing Further Overseas Expansion

One of South Korea's largest cryptocurrency exchanges, Upbit, is looking to expand to more countries across Southeast Asia.

Speaking during CoinDesk's Consensus 2021 conference, Dunamu's CEO Sirgoo Lee, told CoinDesk Korea's global editor, Felix Im, that Upbit was "looking at other countries" to launch its services.

Dunamu is a South Korean fintech firm and the operator of Upbit, which launched the exchange in 2017.

Expanding into new countries could be a net positive for the platform once suspected by Korean authorities of fraudulent activity for allegedly selling crypto that it did not hold.

"We're looking to expand overseas," said Lee. "We did open shop in Southeast Asia and we are expanding our exchanges in that location."

The CEO also said the platform was considering "various possibilities," when asked by Im whether Upbit was seeking to branch into non-fungible tokens and decentralized finance. But he stopped short of providing concrete details.

See also: South Korea’s Dunamu Pledges Nearly $9M to Protect Crypto Investors: Report

Upbit launched its services in Thailand earlier this year after acquiring a digital asset business license from the Thai Securities and Exchange Commission in January.

The exchange began its Southeast Asia expansion into Singapore in late 2018 and then later into Indonesia in early 2019.