Singapore Sees a Lack of Strong Case to Ban Cryptocurrency Trading
The tremendous increase in the crypto trading activities in the last year has caused serious concerns for many government regulatory bodies from around the globe. The government officials have often been talking about the use of cryptos for illicit activities of money laundering and tax evasion.
South Korea which is one of Asia’s biggest economies has been an active participant in the crypto market, the second biggest after Japan in the Asian continent. The crypto craze in South Korea was at its peak at the end of 2017. The craze was so big that digital currencies used to trade at a premium on the Korean exchanges in comparison to other global exchanges. To bring the crypto trading activities in check, the Korean has imposed several regulatory measures following which the investor interest in the crypto markets has turned lukewarm.
However, on the contrary, there is another powerful Asian economy - Singapore - which doesn’t find any need to ban crypto trading at this point in time. While addressing some of the MPs recently, Singapore’s Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam said that the country’s central banks are studying about any potential risks associated with crypto trading but there is no strong case to ban it.
Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam, who is also the head of Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), in a written response, said that “...(MAS) has been closely studying these developments and the potential risks they pose. As of now, there is no strong case to ban cryptocurrency trading here.”
He further continued saying, “For now, the nature and scale of cryptocurrency trading in Singapore does not pose risks to the safety and integrity of our financial system. Further, connections between cryptocurrency trading and Singapore’s financial system are also not significant at present. Singapore’s banking system does not have any signficant (sic) exposure to global and local entities dealing in cryptocurrencies. We hence do not have broader, systemic risk concerns with regard to cryptocurrencies.”
However, Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam in his response has clearly mentioned that he is well aware of the use of cryptos for any illicit activities of money laundering and said that the MAS will take necessary steps in order to tackle this issues.
He said: “We will be subjecting those involved as intermediaries to our anti-money laundering regulations. And we will keep highlighting to Singaporeans that they could lose their shirts when they invest money in cryptocurrencies.”
He also assured that the MAS will be imposing anti-money laundering and anti-terrorism financing (AML/CFT) requirements on all those intermediaries involved in crypto trading activities. The Deputy PM said that "We set out this AML/CFT regulatory framework for virtual currency intermediaries last year as part of our public consultation on the proposed Payment Services Bill."