invezz.com
South Korea has been trying to come up with cryptocurrency regulations for some time, and it is now ready to implement them. However, before it does it, it ordered over 60 of its local cryptocurrency exchanges to suspend their operations a week before the regulations arrive.
The exchanges were also instructed to notify their clients of a partial, or even full suspension of trading by Friday midnight. In order to continue operating, the platforms will have to register with the Financial Intelligence Unit over the next week, by September 24th. They will also have to provide a security certificate from the internet security agency.
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Finally, they are also obligated to partner with banks, so that they can ensure that they have real-name accounts.
What will happen to Korean exchanges?
Naturally, any crypto exchange that fails to register by September 24th will have to close down shop. Even those that do register but do not secure partnerships with banks will not be allowed to trade in Korean won or have anything to do with it.
The local authorities even predicted the scenario of all services having to close operations. In that case, their obligation is to notify customers of the expected closing date, as remind them to withdraw money by at least seven days prior to the closure.
The deadline for doing this is September 17th, meaning today, as the platforms should be aware of whether or not they can meet the necessary requirements by now.
According to what is known, nearly 40 exchanges are set to suspend all services, while around 28 of them have managed to obtain security certificates, but still lack bank partnerships. As a result, some will have to suspend all services, while others only a portion, likely meaning that they will be unable to work with the local fiat currency from this day forward.
In fact, only four exchanges have managed to register and secure bank partnerships to date — Coinone, Upbit, Bithumb, and Korbit. As a result, only these four platforms will continue working uninterrupted.
Meanwhile, several smaller exchanges that managed to obtain certificates but not bank partnerships announced that they intend to continue operating as crypto-to-crypto exchanges, including Flybit, ProBit, and Cashierest. This will be the case until they manage to get a partnership with at least one bank.