The Financial Services Commission (FSC), which oversees financial matters in South Korea, released a statement indicating that U.S. bitcoin ETFs that have recently been launched may not comply with Korean legal regulations.
The regulator believes that domestic broking of a U.S.-listed bitcoin spot ETF by Korean securities firms may potentially clash with the country’s Virtual Asset User Protection Act and the Capital Markets Act without elaborating.
The governor of the Bank of Korea, Lee Ju-yeol, declared in 2017 that cryptocurrencies are commodities rather than legal money and underlined the necessity of regulation in this space.
In its notice, the FSC stated that there will be an additional review soon. This month, in Washington, DC, SEC head Gary Gensler will meet with his counterpart from Korea.
Authorities in South Korea recently said that they intended to draft legislation disclosing the cryptocurrency holdings of their officials.
Citing a misalignment with the company’s investment portfolio approach, Vanguard has chosen not to provide spot bitcoin ETFs, such as BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) and Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC), on its platform in the United States.