South Korean central bank Bank of Korea (BOK) governor, Lee Joo-yeol, has announced that Bitcoin will be regulated as a commodity rather than as a currency. The governor, however, claimed that the central bank will not be launching the regulation very soon.
During the audit of BOK by the National Assembly, Lee claimed that digital currencies like Bitcoin cannot be regarded as money based on the definition of the Bank of International Settlements (BIS).
“It is difficult to look at [virtual currencies] as money by [the definition] of Bank of International Settlements (BIS). Regulation (of virtual currencies) is appropriate because it is regarded as a commodity. It [cannot be] regulated at the level of a currency.”
To promptly tackle the issues involving cryptocurrencies, the South Korean government created in 2016 a digital currency task force to study the regulatory and licensing parameters for Bitcoin and Bitcoin exchanges. In early June 2017, a CNN report stated that the participants in the study ‘failed to agree on whether cryptocurrencies should be included in systems right now and how the systems work if they are included.”
Meanwhile, South Korea’s financial regulator, the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) has issued a ban on initial coin offerings (ICO) guided by the task force. The aim of the ban is to protect investors from possible fraud. This move has led to worries of a campaign against the local digital currency trading market in the country that is similar to the crackdown recently launched by the Chinese government.
This is taken from
cointelegraph.com.
Well, as long as it is not declared to be illegal and that there would be a regulatory framework to go with it, then I think at the end Bitcoin can survive and even flourish in South Korea. Soon, this small country can also be a big leader in the cryptocurrency movement as there seems to be a massive interest building up for the Korean market.
Taken as a commodity or a currency is something we have to leave up to the government authorities as it is their sovereign right to do so. Rather than follow the outright ban initiated by China, having regulations in place for the buying and selling of Bitcoin is the one we always preferred.
