Crypto Market News: South Korea Blocks 27 Exchanges as Zcash and Aave Slide, While Pepeto Eyes a Pepe Style 149x
Anyone reading crypto market news today saw a major market shut out 27 exchanges in one move. South Korea will block sites including KuCoin and MEXC, CoinDesk reported on October 13.
Korean stocks fell 5.5% that day, and bitcoin dipped below $81,000 before climbing back near $83,160 within hours. Crackdowns have shaken crypto before, and each time the market kept growing.
While the headlines chase the rules, something smaller is building underneath them. Pepeto, a meme coin with its own live bridge, has raised more than $11.1 million in its presale. It was built so no exchange ever holds the buyer’s coins.
What Happened in Crypto Market News Today? South Korea Blocks 27 Exchanges
South Korea’s financial watchdog said on October 13 that it will block 27 unlicensed crypto exchange websites, including KuCoin, MEXC and BitMart, per CoinDesk. The move widens last year’s ban on their phone apps, and officials flagged 44 more firms for probes.
Only 28 crypto firms hold a Korean license. Breaking the rules can mean up to five years in prison or a 50 million won fine, Crypto Briefing reported.
For traders, the message is clear. When one regulator can cut off 27 sites in a day, coins left on an exchange are only as safe as that exchange.
Who Should Hold Your Coins After South Korea’s Crackdown?
Pepeto: A $0 Bridge Where No Company Ever Holds Your Coins
The safest answer is that you hold them yourself, and Pepeto built its bridge around that idea. The presale has drawn more than $11.1 million so far, and a Binance listing is approaching.
Moving coins between blockchains usually means trusting a company in the middle. Other bridges charge $15 to $50 a transfer and take minutes or hours. If a move fails, funds can stay locked for good.
Pepeto’s bridge has no middleman. Your tokens lock in an audited contract on the first chain, and once the lock is confirmed, the same tokens appear on the second chain. Nothing extra is printed, and nobody holds an IOU.
It links Ethereum, BNB Chain, Solana, Base and Arbitrum, and transfers take under 60 seconds. The bridge fee is $0, so you pay only network gas. If a transfer fails, the lock reverses on its own.
A bridge cannot change a country’s rules. What it can do is keep your coins under your control from start to finish, whatever regulators decide next week.
Each presale stage ends on a timer or a sales target, whichever comes first, and then the price steps up. Today Pepeto sells at $0.00000019. For anyone who read this week’s news as a warning about custody, Pepeto is the early entry that fits the lesson.
Zcash: Down 8.9% in a Day, With an ETF Filing and an Upgrade Ahead
ZEC trades at $1,177.80 per CoinMarketCap, down 8.89% in 24 hours and far below its $5,941.80 high from 2016. The drop came despite good news. On October 6, Winklevoss filed for a spot Zcash ETF under the ticker WINK, The Block reported.
A vote on the NU7 upgrade is due October 20. Brave New Coin cites an analyst who sees support at $1,100 to $1,300 and a target of $2,000 by early November. Even that would leave ZEC about two thirds below its peak.
Aave: Tokenized Stocks Arrive, but $167 Stands in the Way
AAVE trades at $160.88 per CoinMarketCap, down 4.71% in a day and about 76% below its 2021 peak of $666.86. The business is growing anyway. Aave V4 drew $4.9 million in tokenized stocks within 17 days, per Token Terminal data cited by Tronweekly.
Blockchain.News puts resistance at $167.43 and then $175.53, with support at $151.58. Clearing $175 this month is realistic. Getting back to $666 is a much longer trip.
Crypto Market News Wrap: Pepe Hit $11.9 Billion With No Products, and Its Cofounder Is Back
This week’s crypto market news was full of rules and red charts, and Zcash and Aave both sit far below their old highs. Pepeto is at the other end of the story. It has not even reached its first trading price.
Its cofounder built Pepe, which hit $0.00002825 in December 2024. At that peak, Pepe’s 420.69 trillion tokens were worth near $11.9 billion, with no products behind them. Pepeto has a similar supply of 420 trillion, plus a working exchange and bridge.
Matching Pepe’s peak would mean about 149x from today, turning a $2,000 buy of about 10.5 billion tokens into roughly $297,000. The Pepeto official website shows today’s price, the kind of starting point Pepe’s first buyers had, open only until the presale closes.
Lock in this stage’s Pepeto price on pepetocoin.com
FAQs
Which crypto market news matters most this week?
The crypto market news that matters most is South Korea blocking 27 unlicensed exchanges on October 13, which briefly pushed bitcoin below $81,000.
Can Pepeto reach the value the original Pepe hit?
Pepeto would need about 149x to match Pepe’s 2024 peak, enough to turn $2,000 into roughly $297,000. The Pepeto official website shows the price before the next stage raises it.
