South Korea May Consider Opening up Crypto Market to Foreign Investors

BlockBeats News, April 4th. According to Financefeeds, Kim Sung-jin, Head of the Virtual Asset Department of the Financial Services Commission (FSC) of South Korea, stated that he supports allowing foreign investors to enter the South Korean cryptocurrency market, but the prerequisite is that local exchanges must demonstrate strong anti-money laundering compliance capabilities. Currently, due to capital controls and real-name account requirements, non-residents are almost unable to trade cryptocurrency in Korea. However, as the United States signals a more crypto-friendly policy under the Trump administration, South Korean regulators are beginning to reassess existing restrictions. The FSC is currently still cautious, believing that Korean exchanges still lack in international compliance, especially in terms of Travel Rule implementation. This rule, starting in 2022, requires exchanges to collect and store information of both parties in transactions exceeding 1 million Korean won (about $680), and some platforms have recently lowered the applicable threshold.