The Cryptocurrency markets are under heavy correction following the news coming from South Korea which states that the government officials are preparing a bill to bring to bring a complete ban on cryptocurrency trading in the country.
South Korea’s justice minister Park Sang-ki told on Thursday that the government is preparing a bill to introduce a complete ban on trading of virtual digital currencies on local exchanges. While talking at a press conference at the ministry’s press office, Sang-ki said: “There are great concerns regarding virtual currencies and justice ministry is basically preparing a bill to ban cryptocurrency trading through exchanges.”
A press official at the conference stated that the proposal to impose a ban came after thorough discussions with officials from South Korean government agencies, financial regulators, and the nation’s finance ministry. South Korean news service SBS reported that ‘The Ministry of Justice will draft its own bill, which treats virtual currency brokerage as illegal, aims to shut down exchanges completely, and plans to begin full-fledged ministry discussions this week.’
Soon after the news broke, fear gripped the markets, triggering a massive sell-off over the past 24 hours. Major cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum, which attract significant trading volume from South Korea, took the hardest hit.
Bitcoin plunged by more than 13% or nearly $2000 in value. As per our data, Bitcoin collapsed to as low as $13000 before finally recovering and is currently trading at around $13800 levels, at the press time. The altcoin, however, has managed to gain 10% from this low and is currently trading above $1200.
One of the major reasons why the Korean government is intensifying its grip on the crypto activities in the country is because the craze behind crypto trading has reached to unsurmountable levels affecting the youth as well as across every age group of Korean citizens.
Over the past few months, a huge number of investors have flooded South Korean crypto exchanges, and the influx continues to grow each day.
In response to such investor behavior, officials have expanded their reach and are now conducting on-site investigations at exchanges like Coinone and Bithumb. The South Korean National Tax Service (NTS) is leading the investigation.
Bithumb was quoted saying “It’s true that the NTS has come out with an investigation, but it is difficult to confirm the details of the investigation.” While on the other hand, a Coinone employee told Reuters that “Local police also have been investigating our company since last year, they think what we do is gambling.”