Asian nations are pushing hard for more consumer protection, more oversight and more technical abilities for regulators.
The Financial Services Agency (FSA) — Japan’s principal financial regulator — has suggested several measures to protect users from “unlawful transfers” to crypto exchanges, and one might seriously complicate the peer-to-peer (P2P) transactions market.
The regulator suggests “stopping transfers to crypto-asset exchange service providers if the sender’s name is different from the account name. The current FSA request is written as a recommendation, and it doesn’t demand compliance with specific requirements but instead refers to initiatives. How exactly the banks will react to these recommendations and whether they will disrupt the P2P market remains to be seen.
South Korea’s Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) has also publicly announced tightening scrutiny over crypto. As a part of its work plan for 2024, the agency will introduce a preemptive trading suspension system for suspicious transactions on platforms already operating in South Korea. This will freeze transactions even during the pre-investigation phase. Moreover, the FIU intends to “expand and reinforce” its crypto team in 2024, providing the necessary education and training and launching a “virtual asset analysis system,” tracking and analyzing virtual asset transaction details and “complex movement paths.”
