A prominent voice within the community has cast a critical eye on South Korea’s National Pension Scheme, lambasting the institution for its recent foray into the investment arena with the leading U.S.-based cryptocurrency exchange, Coinbase.
Taking to social media, the influencer known as “Parrot Capital,” boasting a substantial following, contended that the South Korean pension fund had embarked on a precarious investment journey by funneling millions of dollars into Coinbase shares.
Parrot Capital’s critique centered on Coinbase’s association with the ill-fated South Korean crypto venture, Terraform Labs (TFL), responsible for the demise of the cryptocurrency LUNA and the UST stablecoin.
In a tweet, the critic shared a screenshot of a 2021 report confirming Coinbase and Galaxy’s substantial investment of $25 million in decentralized finance through the Terra stablecoin. The purpose of the fund, as stated in the report, was to support Terraform Labs in developing additional applications.
Despite this revelation, the latest report revealing South Korea’s National Pension Scheme’s acquisition of $19.9 million worth of Coinbase shares prompted Parrot Capital to assert that South Korea had not heeded the lessons from the LUNA debacle.
Expressing concern, Parrot Capital suggested that the pension fund was jeopardizing the life savings of senior citizens by engaging in yet another ostensibly risky crypto venture. In a parallel observation, Parrot Capital remarked, “The crypto degeneracy is strong in South Korea, which North Korea is all too happy to take advantage of, too.”
In contrast, crypto researcher Scott Hill dismissed the $19.9 million investment as a trifling amount, constituting a mere 0.0002%. Hill asserted that there was no cause for alarm. However, Parrot Capital countered, emphasizing that it was still an imprudent use of funds, particularly given Coinbase’s recent entanglements with regulatory scrutiny.