Yahoo Finance South Korea’s Top Financial Regulator Is Forming a Crypto Bureau
South Korea’s Financial Service Commission (FSC), the country’s top financial regulator, announced Thursday that it is forming an independent, crypto-focused bureau to supervise digital assets in South Korea.
The new bureau will officially launch in September and fall under the authority of the Korea Financial Intelligence Unit (KFIU), an arm of the FSC that handles anti-money laundering enforcement.
The new bureau will be called the Crypto Asset Monitoring Bureau and will be responsible for overseeing licenses for exchanges and other operators, according to a report from the Korea Times.
In April, FSC officials said that exchanges that don’t register with and receive a license from KFIU by late September won’t be permitted to operate in South Korea. The FSC’s licenses require exchanges to tighten their know-your-customer (KYC) standards and collect personal information about customers.
The bureau will also be responsible for looking out for suspicious activity, including fraud and money laundering, according to the Korea Times.
South Korea’s crypto crackdown is tied to the growing level of debt among young people, which FSC Chief Koh Seung-beom has blamed, at least in part, on digital asset speculation.
