Bitcoin Stalls Near $64K Despite South Korea’s Historic 17% Kospi Rally

Samsung and SK Hynix shares surged more than 23% each, while Bitcoin barely moved over the past 24 hours and most major cryptocurrencies remained in negative territory for the week.

Crypto markets showed little reaction to one of the strongest stock market recoveries of the year on Friday, with Bitcoin trading around $64,300 as South Korean equities posted a record rebound following two weeks of heavy selling.

Most leading cryptocurrencies were nearly unchanged. Ether traded near $1,907, XRP around $1.08, Solana at $74, and Dogecoin at $0.07, with Bitcoin recording about $27 billion in trading volume and Ether seeing roughly $7 billion. BNB stood out as the only major token with a notable daily gain, rising 3% to $590 and maintaining a positive weekly performance. Bitcoin briefly climbed to $65,300 during early Asian trading before retreating within an hour.

The broader weekly performance remained weak. Hyperliquid’s HYPE token declined 5% over the last seven days, while Solana and XRP each dropped 3%, and Bitcoin fell 2%. Ether and Dogecoin were among the few major assets posting weekly gains, each rising about 1%.

Stock markets moved sharply higher instead. South Korea’s Kospi jumped as much as 17%, recovering from a three-day selloff that had pushed the index more than 40% below its June high. Chipmakers led the rally, with Samsung and SK Hynix both gaining over 23%, while Taiwan Semiconductor climbed 10%, making semiconductor stocks the biggest drivers of the broader Asian market recovery.

The rally followed the biggest surge in U.S. semiconductor stocks in more than a year, with the Nasdaq 100 ending a six-day losing streak. Amazon shares gained nearly 10% after hours following strong cloud earnings, while Apple dropped 6% as supply constraints affected its sales outlook.

Bitcoin had closely followed semiconductor stocks throughout July, moving in tandem with the broader chip trade. However, the cryptocurrency held steady despite last Thursday’s $797 billion selloff in U.S. mega-cap technology stocks, Korea’s historic two-day market plunge earlier in the week, and the latest equity market recovery.

A major security incident affecting Bitcoin wallets also failed to impact prices. Around 594 BTC, worth approximately $38 million, was stolen from nearly 500 wallets on Thursday due to a vulnerability in Coldcard hardware wallet key generation, but the event did not trigger any noticeable market reaction.

In currency markets, the Japanese yen weakened after giving up some of Thursday’s gains, which marked its strongest daily advance against the U.S. dollar in more than two years following another intervention by Japanese authorities.

The yen extended its decline after the Bank of Japan kept interest rates unchanged, in line with economists’ expectations. Meanwhile, Treasury prices moved higher alongside the dollar, while oil prices continued their downward trend.