Somchai Sujjapongse, Thai Ministry of Finance’s permanent secretary, thinks that the Bank of Thailand and Thailand’s Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) need to officially warn clients of the risks of investing in crypto markets, as reported in the The Bangkok Post today, Feb.2.
In accordance with Sujjapongse, a working commission on cryptocurrencies, formed by the Bank of Thailand, the SEC, the Ministry of Finance, and the Anti-Money Laundering office, will soon provide a report on how to move forward with crypto regulation.
Speaking about the future of regulating crypto market investing, Sujjapongse said,
“Allowing Bitcoin transactions to be made without warnings and direction from regulators is not acceptable.”
In September 2017, the Thai SEC proved a readiness to help Initial Coin Offerings (ICO) by announcing that they would be drafting rules for ICOs, as they may get into the category of securities under Thai legislation.
After the latter volatility in the crypto markets, Sujjapongse sees a necessity for stringency in Thailand to come to a decision about regulating cryptocurrencies. However, the permanent secretary makes the diversity between regulation of Bitcoin (BTC) and of Blockchain technology:
“It is not correct to consider Blockchain harmful if we do not prefer Bitcoin, as Blockchain technology can create benefits. We can reap benefits from using Blockchain technology.”
A number of banks in Thailand have already begun looking into Blockchain-based technologies for their financial services.
In August 2017 the Bank of Thailand held a meeting with Vitalik Buterin, co-founder of Ethereum, about the opportunity of using Ethereum and other Blockchain services for improving the speed and security of financial transactions. In November 2017, the Bank of Ayudha in Thailand successfully ran a pilot Blockchain project with IBM, the aim of which was to improve back-office effectiveness.
