April 19, 2024

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[THE INVESTOR] Korea will come up with a set of measures to clamp down on the “irrational” investment craze for cryptocurrency here, the country‘s chief economic policymaker said on Jan. 16, with a potential shutdown of exchanges still on the table.

“The government stance is that it needs to regulate cryptocurrency investment as it is a largely speculative investment,” Finance Minister Kim Dong-yeon said in a radio program interview.

“The shutdown of virtual currency exchanges is still one of the options (that the government has),” Kim said, adding that more consultations among government agencies are needed.

The minister said the level of regulation at the moment is important but that there are no viable, concerted global standards.

“We are also tinkering with the option of levying taxes,” he said.

Korea’s financial authorities have stepped up monitoring of cryptocurrency trading as they have warned that a bubble may be set to burst.

Currently, financial authorities ban banks from offering virtual accounts, which are needed to sell or buy cryptocurrencies, to individual customers, the latest measure to help prevent speculative investment for virtual coins.

Opening anonymous cryptocurrency accounts is also banned until banks install a system that ensures only real-name bank accounts and matching accounts at cryptocurrency exchanges for deposits and withdrawals.

By Alex Lee and newswires (alexlee@heraldcorp.com)