South Korean crypto exchange Upbit is planning to build GIWA Chain, a new Ethereum Layer-2 using Optimism’s OP Stack.
South Korea‘s largest crypto exchange, Upbit, operated by Dunamu, is preparing to build more of its own blockchain infrastructure through an Ethereum Layer-2 with a very exchange-friendly setup.
In a Monday blog post, Optimism Foundation CEO Jing Wang said Upbit partnered with the foundation on GIWA Chain, a new Layer-2 network built on the OP Stack. The network is already live as testnet, while mainnet is still only planned.
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Upbit Wants the Traffic Cop
According to the announcement, GIWA Chain is planned as the first network on the self-managed tier of OP Enterprise, meaning Upbit would run the primary sequencer and control the chain’s configuration.
The Optimism Foundation, in the meantime, would provide monitoring, engineering support and a backup sequencer if things break.
The Optimism Foundation framed Upbit’s plan as another crypto exchange choosing the OP Stack for its own blockchain. Coinbase, for instance, used the OP Stack for Base, while Kraken used it for Ink.
How Big Upbit Is
Upbit is South Korea’s largest crypto exchange, with Reuters putting its domestic market share at about 70% in late 2025. Its operator Dunamu was valued at about $10.2 billion, in Naver Financial’s planned all-stock acquisition.
CoinGecko data also shows Upbit held 6.7% of top centralized exchange spot volume in 2024, after 8.5% in 2023, 6.9% in 2022 and 12.2% in 2021.
The more recent picture is a little less shiny though. CoinGecko’s 2025 exchange report put Upbit at 5.5% market share among the top 10 centralized exchanges, with volume down 18.9% year over year.
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