370. The Won

South Korea has officially begun twenty-four-hour trading of the South Korean won. This means the won is now available to trade at any hour of the day or night, including hours that were previously unavailable for won trading.

Previously, the won traded from nine in the morning until two in the morning Korean time, after which it stopped being available for trading. This arrangement was itself the result of a 2024 expansion. The current expansion removes the two in the morning cutoff entirely. The won did not trade after two in the morning, and then, on July 6, 2026, it began trading after two in the morning. This is the change that occurred.

The rationale involves international investors and time zones and the general principle that money should be accessible at all times, which is a principle that most currencies adopted some decades ago. South Korea has now also adopted it. The won joins a large number of currencies that can be traded whenever a person wishes to trade them.

At the time of this writing, the won is trading. It is unclear whether the won knows this. What is clear is that somewhere in the world right now, at an hour that would previously have been outside won-trading hours, a person is trading the won. They are doing this for the first time in the sixty-four-year history of the won's trading hours, and they are probably not thinking about that, because people who trade currency at three in the morning are thinking about other things.