South Korea’s Financial Services Commission (FSC) said on Friday that “it will ban raising money through all forms of virtual currencies,” Reuters reported. The publication conveyed the regulator’s statement.
“Raising funds through ICOs seem to be on the rise globally,” the FSC said after a meeting with the finance ministry, the Bank of Korea and the National Tax Service. “Our assessment is that ICOs are increasing in South Korea as well.”
The news outlet elaborated that “the decision to ban ICOs as a fundraising tool was made as the government sees such issues as increasing the risk of financial scams.” For any parties involved in the issuance of ICOs, there will be “stern penalties,” the authority noted.
Korea’s move follows China’s which banned ICOs on September 4, a decision subsequently followed by the closing down of several bitcoin exchanges. However, Korea is not extending the ban to cryptocurrency exchanges. The Korean government will continue to monitor cryptocurrency markets to see if additional regulations are needed, Friday’s announcement detailed.
What's the source though. It would be better if you did share the source, since if there isn't one then we can safely pass this as a rumor!
Though, I would say if this was true, then they had it coming. There are more scams than real investments that happened in ICOs nowadays and a lot of scammers are masking their activities using this new method. I however, think that it should not be totally banned but more of regulated to prevent fraud.