Graphics card prices double as cryptocurrency mining surges in South Korea

With the rapid development of the virtual currency market, the number of Korean participants in the blockchain ecosystem who "mine" virtual currencies through computing programs has increased significantly , and the demand for PC graphics cards in South Korea has also surged.

Following the news that Korean Internet cafes were closed to focus on mining, according to relevant industry reports in March , NVIDIA ’s “ RTX   The price of 3080 graphics cards has jumped to the 2 million won mark , and they are hard to come by .

In October last year , before the virtual currency market took off, the product was priced at around 900,000 to 1 million won.

RTX 3000 series​   The previous price of 3070 was only 600,000 won, but the current trading price in the market has reached 1.3 million to 1.5 million won , and its value has also doubled.

"As graphics cards flow into bitcoin mining farms, their prices have risen significantly and the amount in circulation has also decreased significantly, " said a clerk at an electronics shopping mall in Yongsan District, Seoul.

As the scarcity of graphics cards has caused their prices to soar , NVIDIA has also announced that it will limit the graphics card's performance for Bitcoin mining through a recent software update . However, some industry analysts believe that this is a layout for launching graphics cards dedicated to mining .

In fact, graphics cards of the RTX series are in a state of "high price but low demand" not only in South Korea, but also in China.

The RTX3080, with an official price of 5,499 yuan, has been hyped up to eight or nine thousand or even tens of thousands of yuan . After all, China's "mining volume" accounts for a large part of the world's mining volume .

However, China is currently imposing sanctions on these mining farms. Recently, China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region announced that it would completely shut down its virtual currency mining sites by the end of April . This is because the operation of mining farms consumes a lot of electricity.

In fact, the current price of graphics cards is rising sharply. In addition to the indirect factor of "mining" of virtual currency , it is also inseparable from the severe shortage of some materials for graphics card OEM, rising costs , and the epidemic causing workers to stop work and production, and insufficient production capacity of OEM factories . These are the direct factors that have caused the current situation of graphics cards.

Bitcoin

Graphics

South Korea