By David Drake
Despite banning initial coin offerings (ICOs) some months ago, South Korea seems to be re-positioning itself to become a major global player in the industry. Other than lifting the ICO ban and rolling out strict regulations, the Financial Services Commission (FSC) has stated that it is not opposed to as it plans to implement cross border crypto regulations agreed during the G20 summit.
Additionally, the Bank of Korea has said that investments pose a small risk to South Korea’s financial market. As of December 2017, the balance held in South Korea’s local banks stood at $1.79 billion, which is about 8% of the country’s brokerage houses total deposits.
Significant Impact
Although the share of balances in South Korean banks is small compared to other sectors, these decisions will likely have a significant effect on the global market. According to Jess Davis, CEO of , the significance of the decisions is an impending global acceptance as countries are putting their infrastructure in place.
He says, “The significance of Korea and outlying G20 countries support mean that there is impending acceptance of as a technology and medium of exchange. Currently countries and banks are putting in place the global infrastructure to connect all countries on similar payment systems and find the highest and best uses for distributed immutable technology.”
The growth witnessed in the space has led to an emergence of innovative solutions on the . Some notable ICO projects include with parent-children interaction solutions, BlockVest that utilizes smart contracts to facilitate digital asset management and that provides customer satisfaction solutions to the e-commerce industry.
Other revolutionary ICO projects are precious metal platform , , a networking, collaborative and smart data banking platform and , a peer-to-peer exchange platform for digital currency traders.
A Paradigm Shift
Alex Karasulu, co-CEO and founder of is of the opinion that there is a shift in the global market from countries that resist crypto-friendly countries. He holds that countries that try to stop will only lose on wealth.
He says, “South Korea’s directional pivot removes another brick in the wall. In fact, it removes several bricks because it demonstrates the futility, yet again, of governments resisting the global tsunami. , an economic juggernaut, demonstrated the severe repercussions of trying to stop that train in 2017, with capital flight into progressive neighbors like South Korea and Singapore.”
“The domino effect has begun and we’ve seen it twice now with two large economies that overreacted and have corrected themselves to embrace based banking, distribution events, and exchanges. Otherwise the wealth simply seeps out of their institutions into those outside that are more friendly,”he adds.
Similarly, Antonio Sainz, co-founder and CEO of wants other countries to follow South Korea’s decision as any contrary move will only see them miss the opportunity to lead the market.
He says, “In the market there are two positions: those who want to lead the market and not lose this opportunity and the fearful who seek protection via regulations and who can lose the train of innovation and the market. Let each country choose its position. Korea seems that they have chosen their way, I hope the others countries to choose the right train.”
Disclaimer: David Drake is on the advisory board for most of the firms mentioned or quoted in this article.
Published at Fri, 26 Apr 2019 13:32:03 +0000
