South Korea’s financial regulator would soon unveil its survey result of the blockchain developers, but few believe the Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) would change its current ban on initial coin offerings (ICOs).
Last September, the FSC send 52 questionnaires to the blockchain developers planning ICOs. The questionnaires include the list of the major shareholders and the executives, the purpose and the timing of the ICO and the blockchain platforms the developers plan to build.
Not so many companies responded to the survey as the response was not mandatory, and the regulators appeared to have listed up the questionnaires without a full understanding of the blockchain industry, a Seoul blockchain startup executive told The Block Media Korea.
The FSC also seemed to be behind the times because blockchain developers prefer initial exchange offering (IEO) or the security token offering (STO) to ICOs. The cryptocurrency exchange sells IEOs to members while the STO is like the existing marketable securities companies issue in the stock market.
The survey was not a move to develop the blockchain industry, but a show of gesture that the government knows the market, a blockchain analyst said.
In 2017, the Office of the Prime Minister had formed a pan-national task force on the blockchain industry, but few official records remain that policymakers had an official meeting.
