Korea's Largest Crypto Exchange Is Done Playing Domestic

**SJ Yoon** (0:00)
Even though 2025 sort of towards the end of it wasn't really good in Korea, still the crypto trading volume hit 1.5 trillion dollars and registered accounts across Korean exchanges are 25 million when our entire population is 52 million. So yeah, you do the math.

**Sam Ewen** (0:31)
Hey, it's Sam Ewen. For this spotlight interview, we are talking to SJ Yoon.
SJ is the chief brand and impact officer at Upbit. They're the largest crypto exchange in Korea. They have some great plans for going even larger. And we had a great time in Korea last year. We went to Korea Blockchain Week, and it was such a dynamic community of people, very retail-focused right now. They're going more institutional, and we thought it'd be great to profile a deep dive into Korea while we're building towards Korea Blockchain Week, which is coming again in September. So we just wanted to sit down with SJ. She's a really interesting background in Korea, and we wanted to understand the 101 of blockchain and crypto in Korea. So stay tuned after the break, SJ Yoon.

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**Sam Ewen** (1:50)
SJ, welcome to the show. We just are really interested in getting to know you, Upbit, the Korean market and the plans for the future. Thank you for joining us.

**SJ Yoon** (2:01)
Thank you for having me.

**SPEAKER_3** (2:03)
It's a pleasure and honor.

**Sam Ewen** (2:05)
As well. I know we spoke a bit at consensus this year, but I think it'd be great for us to dive in a little bit deeper into your background. Tell us about the formative moments that really brought you to where you are today.

**SJ Yoon** (2:18)
Initially, I started with consulting. I was with the Boston Consulting Group, and with the vision to stay in the business world for 20 years, I had a long-term plan. Okay, I go to consulting, then I go on MBA, and then I come back and find an industry. All of that. Then I quickly realized, at that point, I wasn't super interested in helping clients make more money. They felt to me that I was more interested in knowing about the world, learning about people, helping people in some ways.
So, I started as a program director at SBS, Seoul Broadcasting System, which is one of the three major national TV stations in Korea. And I was a game show, entertainment show producer there, like producing and directing talk shows and so on.
And that was really fun, but sort of I again learned about myself.
I wanted to do more than just fun. I wanted to sort of, you know, feel more fulfilled by, you know, doing something that felt more meaningful to me, helping people in some ways. And so I thought I would want to save the world. So I went to Harvard. At that point, I went to Harvard Law School and the Kennedy School of Government, doing a joint degree between a doctor at the law school and masters in public policy, thinking that I would want to work for an international organization like the UN. And then when I started sort of like studying it and meeting people from the UN and so on, nothing against the UN. It's just, I felt like it wasn't for me. I thought, you know, I thought international law would be a sort of rule of law, but it's actually kind of promises between countries. And it's a little bit difficult to enforce. And so I felt like, if you know Koreans, like Koreans are quite known for being impatient and I'm one of them, if not more so than an average one. So I decided I needed to kind of go somewhere where I can make a difference quicker. So I gave up on that idea and sort of did a startup with a couple of friends from Harvard called Coupang, which is now like Korean Amazon, which is on NYSC. And then I left pretty early on, which is a pity. But, and then I went to Hong Kong and practiced law at a British law firm called Link Laters.
Sort of, then I worked for, now I work for 10 years at an education company, Swedish origin, of Swedish origin called EF Education First, as country manager for Korea, then heading Asia for their boarding school division. So I did that for 10 years, and then I created another startup, sort of the social ranking metaverse, I called it. But it didn't go very well. And then when I was kind of deciding where to, so now is the time that I'm kind of, it's taken a while, but now I'm coming to crypto. I wanted to join an industry that is a wave, like a global wave. I wanted to ride away as my last career, and I was looking, and of course crypto is a global phenomenon, and it's the next sort of generation technology. I believe the blockchain and stable coin, and all of the financial infrastructure and everything built upon it. And so I wanted to work for, in the crypto industry, obviously, and then I wanted to, when it comes to choosing a company, I wanted to choose a company that has great potential to go global. And Upbit definitely is, has been pretty domestic just because sort of the regulations have been a little bit slower than the technology goal development, but has great potential to go global. And I also wanted to work where I could make a difference and contribute. And sort of, I'm a very different blood than all the developers and all the C levels here.