Behind bitcoin’s stunning rise lies a new force in global financial markets: millions of individual Asian investors.

Despite the attention focused on the launch of bitcoin futures in the U.S. last weekend, the center of gravity for trading the virtual currency, measured by volumes, has been in the East—starting in China, before shifting earlier this year to Japan and recently to South Korea as the latest hot spot.

Unlike past financial frenzies—such as the dot-com bubble of the late 1990s, when U.S. retail investors only piled in at the later stages of the rally—individual investors have been first to the party, fueling bitcoin’s 1,600% rise this year.

“Bitcoin is one of the few markets we’ve ever had in history where you’ve seen these astronomical gains around the world and the retail investors in Asia are the ones driving it,” said Chris Weston, chief market strategist at IG Group, one of the world’s largest online trading platforms. “It feels like this whole thing is being driven by the average Joe who isn’t nearly as financially literate as a professional fund manager.”

Various forces have stoked Asia’s bitcoin fever. While individual wealth has been growing in recent years, particularly in China and South Korea, lucrative investment opportunities can be hard to find, with property markets expensive and stock markets fully valued.