According to ChainCatcher, South Korean lawmaker Choi Eun-sik has proposed a revision to the Foreign Exchange Transactions Act aimed at preventing money laundering and other foreign exchange crimes related to virtual assets. The revision proposes the establishment of a virtual asset trading monitoring system, the improvement of the institutional foundation for fintech foreign exchange services, enhancing the convenience of foreign exchange transactions for individuals and businesses, and strengthening the intelligent construction of the foreign exchange monitoring system.
It stated that the rapid development of virtual assets and financial technology in recent years has diversified cross-border transaction methods, but the current laws have failed to cover these changes, leading to regulatory blind spots, particularly with the increasingly serious issues of virtual asset money laundering and illegal foreign exchange trading.
According to data from the Financial Information Analysis Institute (FIU), the number of suspicious transaction reports from virtual asset merchants increased by 48.8% last year compared to the year before. The Ministry of Finance plans to add definitions for virtual assets and virtual asset merchants next year, requiring virtual asset merchants to register before conducting cross-border transactions and to regularly report users' transaction records to the Bank of Korea.
The revised proposal is expected to be implemented in the second half of next year.