Financial authorities in South Korea are demanding customer data from all local banks. The reason for this is for the authorities to locate and ultimately identify all crypto exchanges in the country. The Korean Herald reports that many of the nation’s financial regulators are currently summoning major banks so that they can give away vital data on the banks’ businesses with South Korean crypto exchanges. These authorities are even seeking corporate accounts, going as far as evaluating the banks’ monitoring methodologies.
At the same time, South Korea is currently adopting new severe crypto regulations to meet the spike in crypto interest. One of the most important new rulings sees all South Korean crypto exchanges maintaining bank accounts under the name of each individual user. This is hindering small exchanges throughout, many of which who are struggling to get a banking partner. However, the big exchanges, like Bithumb, Upbit, Korbit, and Coinone, have managed pretty well.
Furthermore, officials in South Korea estimate that some 200 small crypto exchanges are currently operational in the nation without a license. The regulators are planning on exposing these, and sanctioning them. Crypto exchanges need to comply by updating the authorities with regular operational reports. Fail to do so, and the exchanges might be sanctioned up to $44 000, or/and up to 5 years in prison.
