LSK surges to $0.37 riding on Upbit spot trading, Binance derivatives market

LSK was among the breakout tokens for the past day, rising by over 70%. The token rallied after years of an ongoing downward slide, and is now attempting a comeback.

Lisk, one of the legacy chains, is attempting to make a comeback. Its native asset, LSK, rallied by up to 79% in the past day, going vertical after months of sliding. Despite the lack of an altcoin market, events like the LSK breakout are affecting some older tokens, reawakening them with derivative trading.

LSK traded at $0.37, bouncing at the bottom of a long slide for the past year. In late 2024, LSK had a bigger breakout to $1.40, when it first announced its comeback. The current rally is yet to show its sustainability, and whether the Lisk team is closer to its goals.

LSK broke out, boosted by Upbit trading against the South Korean won. | Source: Coingecko

The Lisk project is also trying to make a comeback with expanded Web3 apps. As of November 2025, the sluggish altcoin market left LSK with minimal mindshare, based on Messari data. The dinosaur chain, which existed for a long time with hardly any apps, also failed to draw attention to itself during meme season.

Lisk attempted to break out as an L1 with side chains and a JavaScript SDK to attract app teams. Currently, Lisk has migrated to an OP stack chain, joining the Superchain along with Base and Optimism. The chain secures just $9.1M in value locked, with a version of Morpho and Velodrome DEX.

LSK open interest reaches all-time peak

The LSK breakout provided enough direction for the derivative market. Open interest rose to an all-time high of over $22M.

During previous bull markets, LSK mostly relied on spot trading and lost its position to other hotter assets.

The LSK asset also underwent a full transformation. During its ICO stage, LSK was an Ethereum-based token. Later, LSK migrated to its native chain, powered by 100 validators. That chain saw relatively low usage during two bear markets, leading the Lisk team to come back to Ethereum.

LSK now trades in its tokenized form, with Binance as one of its main markets. For now, LSK has not seen any Hyperliquid activity.

LSK trading rises on Upbit activity

Trading volumes for LSK shifted to Upbit, one of the leading South Korean markets. The token is an anomaly, with over 81% of its volumes against the South Korean won.

Despite the recent slowdown of South Korean markets, LSK benefited from its legacy market. The token lined up among the top 5 most traded assets on Upbit, even surpassing Solana trading activity.

The LSK spot market is further supported by Binances derivative trading. Around $13.7M in LSK open interest has accumulated on Binance, with the rest on Bybit. Based on the liquidation heatmap, the hike to $0.37 liquidated all short positions available and was followed by an almost immediate downturn to $0.35.

In the past day, the rally was also due to a short squeeze, with $1.4M in short liquidations and only around $370K in long liquidations. LSK positions are roughly balanced after the liquidations.