Crypto trading, user signups see jump in India on stable bitcoin

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Indian crypto activity has seen a spike in recent weeks with trading volume and user signups witnessing a jump of up to 45% thanks to stable bitcoin price and weakness in the rupee.

Bitcoin prices have been consolidating within an increasingly narrow range even as global equity and bond markets continued to tread the challenging ground with growing evidence of stress developing in sovereign debt and currency markets this week.

On a 30-day basis, bitcoin (BTC) is up around 2%. In the traditional asset markets, S&P 500 in the US is down 3%, while in India, BSE Sensex is down more than 1% on a one-month basis. These markets have seen a decent spike over the past few days. In the forex market, the rupee (INR) slumped close to 3% in September.

Shivam Thakral, chief executive officer, BuyUcoin, said BTC-INR trading pair is getting a lot of traction from seasoned investors on the platform.

“The main reason behind this trend is the falling rupee and underperforming stock market, which is pushing the investors towards digital assets. The high inflation is resulting in rapid depletion of wealth and investors are looking at digital assets like bitcoin as a store value to prevent inflationary damage to their wealth,“ said Thakral.

BuyUcoin has seen a spike of 40-45% in BTC-INR trading pair and a 30% jump in new user signups in the second quarter of the financial year 2023.

Another crypto exchange Unocoin is witnessing a similar trend.

“Compared to August, we have seen September to be a better month. The user registrations per day are up by 20% and volumes are up by 40%," said Sathvik Vishwanath, co-founder and CEO of Unocoin.

This spike in crypto activity in India has come as a respite for exchanges, who have battling crash