Major Due south Korean exchange Bithumb has launched leverage trading for Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) on its global platform.

While the substitution states that the motion is in response to "a surge in demand in crypto services," Bithumb Global'southward introduction of margin comes just weeks subsequently the largest deleverage event in the history of Bitcoin.

March thirteen crypto crash drives largest deleveraging in history of crypto

Bithumb's introduction of margin trading comes less than four weeks after the tape March 12–13 crash that saw the prices of many cryptocurrencies tumble more than 50% in less than 2 days.

Data produced by Skew published in a Coinbase blog shows that the crash drove a record deleveraging in Bitcoin markets.

Skew estimates that before the crash, roughly $4 billion worth of open leveraged BTC positions were open on Deribit, CME, FTX, Bitfinex, Huobi, Bakkt, OKEx, Binance, Kraken, Bybit and BitMEX combined in the run-upwardly to the crash.

Source: Coinbase

Source: Coinbase

Afterwards the crash, open up leveraged positions across the eleven exchanges was beneath $1 billion — comprising a more 75% drop.

Bithumb adds margin trading as crypto demand spikes

Bithumb Global asserts that despite the "global economic slowdown coupled with the global lock-out driven by the COVID-xix crises" existence an imminent threat to global trade, the crypto industry "has seen an upsurge of involvement from people beyond the world."

The exchange attributes the increasing interest in crypto to a large number of people looking for "alternative digital assets in times of doubt."

While Bithumb supports spot trading for 115 cryptocurrencies and tokens beyond 168 pairings, margin trading has initially been launched for just two pairings — BTC/USDT and ETH/USDT. The maximum leverage for the pairings is 5x.

The exchange also announced back up for cryptocurrency purchased via Visa payments in Indian rupees and the United Arab Emirates dirham.