ANIME, the native token of the Animecoin Foundation, surged 12% after the major South Korean exchange Bithumb announced its listing of the meme coin.

Animecoin (ANIME) rose to an intraday high of $0.0502 on Jan. 31, marking a 15% surge from its weekly low of $0.0437 as of press time. The altcoin market cap was seated at $278 million while its daily trading volume was up 40%, hovering around $153 million.

The Azuki-backed meme coin rallied after Bithumb, a major South Korea-based crypto exchange, announced the addition of a KRW trading pair for the ANIME token on Jan. 31, alongside the VTHO token at 7 PM KST. The token will be available on the Arbitrum network.

Buy orders for ANIME will be restricted for approximately five minutes after trading begins. During this period, sell orders will be limited to prices within -10% to +100% of the base price. Automated orders can be placed only after the first trade has been executed following the start of trading. 

According to the announcement, the base price for the Animecoin token is expected to be approximately $66.11 once trading officially begins.

An ANIME/KRW trading pair will enable direct trading between the ANIME token and the South Korean won.

On Jan. 23, Upbit, South Korea’s largest cryptocurrency exchange by trading volume, listed three ANIME trading pairs, including ANIME/KRW, ANIME/BTC, and ANIME/USDT.  Animecoin has also been listed on other major crypto exchanges, including Binance, Bybit, and OKX.

500 million ANIME was airdropped to BNB holders subscribed to BNB Simple Earn products. Since its launch on centralized exchanges, the token has steadily dropped and is down over 72% from its all-time high of $0.1861, which was reached on Jan. 23.

Listings on prominent exchanges like Upbit or Bithumb often trigger significant price rallies; the current rally could extend once trading is live. However, for newly launched tokens like ANIME, the effect can be adverse, as traders often rush to sell the holdings acquired during token generation events.

What is ANIME coin?

ANIME, a meme coin, was launched as the “culture coin of the anime industry” but is expected to find utility as a governance token for Animechain, an upcoming Arbitrum Orbit Layer-3 being developed by the Animecoin Foundation, which also developed ANIME.

Animechain is slated for launch in the first quarter of 2025 and could significantly affect the price trajectory for ANIME by enhancing its utility.