According to a Bloomberg report on July 19th, South Korea's approximately $4 trillion stock market is becoming an important window for fund managers in London, New York, and Tokyo to observe global AI risk appetite. The stock price fluctuations of Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix continue to impact global chip stocks, and some Japanese traders have added the KOSPI index to their daily watchlist.

The correlation between the South Korean market and US tech stocks has strengthened significantly. Bloomberg data shows that the 60-day correlation coefficient between the KOSPI index and the Nasdaq 100 index has risen to 0.46, near a two-year high and approximately three times the five-year average of 0.16. Last week, the South Korean market fell nearly 9% due to renewed doubts about the prospects for AI demand, and the decline subsequently spread to Wall Street, with SK Hynix's American Depositary Receipts falling 9.3%.

However, the high leverage in the South Korean market has amplified volatility. The KOSPI index has fallen 25% from its June high, wiping out approximately $1 trillion in market capitalization, with Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix both experiencing share price declines of at least 30%. South Korea recently suspended the listing of new single-stock leveraged trading products to curb speculation and market volatility.

Despite this, the KOSPI index has still risen 62% this year, ranking among the top major global markets. Given the key positions of Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix in memory chip supply, many analysts believe that as long as the AI boom continues, the South Korean stock market will remain a significant bellwether for global AI and semiconductor trading.

According to BlockBeats, on July 19th, CryptoVizArt, Chief Research Analyst at Glassnode, published an article stating that a heatmap of the cost base distribution of short-term holders shows that during Bitcoin's rebound from $57,000, a new round of token transfers occurred in the $62,000 to $65,000 range.

He believes this structure has two sides. On the one hand, buyers actively accumulate during the upward trend, which may create a new cost base, providing conditions for Bitcoin to further test the $66,000 level and above.

On the other hand, much of the current accumulation of chips is concentrated at the tail end of a local rebound. If Bitcoin fails to effectively break through $66,000, the risk of the market forming a short-term top will increase. $66,000 is a key short-term level for judging both scenarios mentioned above.

BlockBeats reported on July 19th that Ostium released an update regarding the attack. Its liquidity provider vault was attacked on July 15th, resulting in the loss of 23,752,746 USDC. Preliminary investigations indicate that the attackers compromised the off-chain infrastructure providing price data to the protocol and submitted spoofed illegitimate price reports. They then extracted artificially created profits from the vault by rapidly opening and closing multiple large positions.

Ostium stated that traders' collateral, stored in isolated smart contracts, was unaffected by the incident, and all trading positions remain open. The team suspended trading and froze all trading contracts within 60 minutes of the initial attack. Currently, Ostium is collaborating with Mandiant, zeroShadow, Collisionless, SEAL 911, and law enforcement agencies, and coordinating with trading platforms, bridging contracts, and stablecoin issuers to advance the investigation. The engineering team is focusing on repairing and strengthening the relevant infrastructure to support the secure resumption of trading.

Ostium stated that it will notify traders of contract unfreezing at least 24 hours in advance. Once trading resumes, existing positions will be priced at the reopening price, unaffected by price fluctuations during the suspension period. Addressing the affected liquidity providers and ensuring a safe resumption of trading remain the top priorities.