Seven large domestic securities companies in South Korea have filed to establish exchanges for bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, per a local report from NewsPim.
Only two of the companies, Samsung Securities and Mirae Asset Securities, were cited in the report. However, all seven companies have applied for preliminary approval to operate an exchange within the first-half of 2023.
Mirae is the largest investment bank by market cap in South Korea with $648 billion in managed assets. The securities company plans to establish a subsidiary under its consultation arm Mirae Consulting to operate the exchange.
Additionally, Mirae seeks to onboard technical staff for the research and development of bitcoin and other blockchain-based platforms, according to the report.
Similarly, Samsung is conducting studies on how best to enter the bitcoin and cryptocurrency ecosystem. The securities company attempted to spearhead the development of a cryptocurrency trading platform last year, but failed to acquire the necessary talent to do so, according to the report.
The sudden influx of institutional interest in South Korea was reportedly driven by the recent presidential election of Yoon Suk-Yeol. On his campaign trail, the president of South Korea promised deregulation of the bitcoin and cryptocurrency markets.
“We must shift to a negative regulation system to ensure at least the virtual asset market has no worries,” Suk-Yeol said at the time.
Indeed, the country’s Financial Services Commission (FSC) plans to act with regulatory adaptation by promoting a regulatory framework for these types of companies. The framework has routinely been requested by the North Korean Financial Investment Association, according to the report.
Additionally, the FSC will reportedly revise the existing legislation for cryptocurrencies and securities in order to separate security tokens and non-security tokens.