Arriving in Korea (First Leg of the IO Asia Tour)
This was our first stop on the IO Asia Tour: Korea Blockchain Week — 17,000 people, mountains of swag, TradFi colliding with DeFi under giant LED screens and cute mascots. We came to see what that collision looks like up close. Late summer sliding into early autumn; Korea was green and beautiful. Seoul felt clean and alive, even if the traffic was permanently gridlocked.
Notes from my pocketbook
- About one in three Koreans now owns some kind of digital asset.
- Only around a tenth hold the “big two”, Bitcoin and Ethereum.
- Almost all trading flows through Upbit — now owned by Naver, South Korea’s biggest search engine and tech platform (think Google, but Korean, complete with its own maps).
- Average portfolio? Two or three thousand dollars, the price of a decent scooter.
Up on the City Walls
Before the conference chaos I walked with Moritz Angermann @4ngerman, our Head of Platform Engineering, up the old city walls. The path was steep from the Palace streets, but at the top the noise fell away. We drank burdock tea, looked out over a green Seoul, and talked about work, his year living here with his young family, and what it’s like for two people who’ve been at IO almost as long as each other to finally catch up in person.
Stablecoins, Regulatory Evolution, DATs and the Number TWO
Stablecoins and decentralised asset treasuries (DATs) dominated day one at Korea Blockchain Week — pitched as a way for corporates and investors to get one-click exposure to crypto’s market beta without holding tokens. The programme was crowded: no speaker names or topics on screen, so you often had to piece talks together on the fly. The venue was heaving too: queues up staircases, around corners, even for water. Heavy TradFi content under giant LED screens and cute mascots, with people lugging swag bags almost as wide as they were.
In his keynote Charles framed Korea as a regulatory leader, reminding everyone…, reminding everyone that “the future will be decentralised” and that this generation “has a seat at the table.” Meanwhile Dan Singleton spoke about decentralised asset treasuries as the new on-ramp for corporates.
And then there was our running joke about “TWO.” It began on day one in the gelato queue. The water had run out so I joined the line at a gelato stall and picked up two small tubs, one for Tim Harrison and one for me. As I turned to go a lady behind me unleashed a long, drawn-out “TWOOOOOO???” in a strong Korean accent, as if I’d just doubled up on the ice cream for myself. My colleague cracked up at me being “shamed” for greediness, and from then on whenever we saw anything in pairs the “Twoooo” joke came back.
Storms and Sideblock Event
At Sideblock we finally put faces to names. Oscar West @OscarW3st introduced us around and I caught up with Jake Choi from Presto and Dr Jacob Mendel of Parlin, a leading Web3 infrastructure provider in LATAM. It was set up under a big roofed area, open to the air, with pizza laid out as people talked about gaming, infrastructure and Web3 payments rather than finance. As we left a torrential thunderstorm hit and the skyline vanished in sheets of rain. We were soaked and handed plastic ponchos. I threw mine on too quickly over my backpack and got wedged half-in, half-out of the taxi door, flailing to get free for a minute before having to take it all off to get in and getting soaked in the process.
A Quiet Hour on the River
After days of gridlocked streets and endless queues, even a short drive to the airport could take two hours. The Han River cruise was a rare break for our core team. Midnight Foundation were on board too. As the boat turned the hour struck and the Banpo Bridge fountains erupted into a light and water show, apparently the longest fountain in the world. Other boats slowed to watch. For a moment Seoul’s roar faded to a hush.
A Parting Gift
On our last day we were handed a bottle of apple brandy made from fallen Korean apples. I haven’t opened it yet, but it looks too good to stay on the shelf for long.
From Seoul we head to Vietnam for the next leg of the IO Asia Tour.