Southeast Asian authorities continue to develop digital currency laws

South Korean authorities, though quite recently banning ICOs, told they are not going to prohibit the free exchange of cryptocurrency for fiat money and cryptocurrency exchanges. Officials took an approach which reminds of the current situation in Russia: if something is not the part of the law, this does not mean it is illegal.

“Though we are monitoring the practice of cryptocurrency trading, we don't have plans right now to directly supervise exchanges. Supervision will come only after the legal recognition of digital tokens as a legitimate currency”, tells Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) Governor Choe Heung-sik.

Meanwhile in Malaysia, the government focuses on countering cryptocurrency money laundering, which still remains a problem, even though some institutional investors are now going to invest massive sums in the cryptocurrency market. The reputation of the latter grows, but Malaysian authorities are still careful about this channel of money, and thus they decided to make everybody who changes cryptocurrency for fiat currency to report where the cryptocurrency originally came from. Malaysian Anti-Money Laundering, Anti-Terrorism Financing and Proceeds of Unlawful Activities Act justifies this demand, governmental representatives tell.

And, lastly, in Philippines, the local Securities and Exchange Commission member Emilio Aquino proposes to regulate cryptocurrencies as securities. This strikingly resembles the approach of the United States, with only one difference — the U.S. SEC does not view coins as securities, they only regulate tokens as such. According to Mr. Aquino, however, his proposal is going to put an end to the vague status of cryptocurrencies and existing rules will be applied, which, of course, takes less time than the development of some new regulations on the theme.