Taiwan to Open Doors for Cryptocurrency World
The Taiwanese government, following moves made by neighbors like Japan and South Korea, will take on a new cryptocurrency direction in the not so distant future.
Speaking at a gathering committed to anti-money laundering (AML) on Friday April 20th, Chiu Tai-san, Taiwan’s Minister of Justice, said that the nation will create and actualize an administrative system for cryptocurrencies by November, as indicated by the Asia Times. The essential objective of the coming controls will be to keep cryptocurrencies from becoming instruments for tax evasion.
The declaration was made at a financial industry money laundering conference organized last month by the Taiwan Financial Services Coalition (FSC). Chiu Tai-san said the important control systems and laws to govern and manage cryptocurrencies will be set by the FSC, with the collaboration of the Ministry of Interior, the nation’s national bank, and it’s Investigation Bureau. Previously, in an attempt to gather information, the government’s legal departments sought information from two cryptocurrency trading platforms regarding their operations.
FSC director Wellington Koo said that the present issue with cryptocurrencies is the absence of clarity surrounding ‘who has obtained it [cryptocurrencies] and who it is sold to.’ Koo was quoted towards the end of last year telling law makers that the nation would not emulate China’s example in banning cryptocurrencies.
However, there are still concerns with respect to the cryptocurrency market and its utilization for illegal tax avoidance exercises because of its unregulated nature. The Taiwanese government is hoping to push controls which will help keep such risk from happening in the country.
As a major aspect of the AML program, the FSC has requested that banks list crypto-exchanging platforms’ records as ‘high-chance records.’ This will imply that if transactions through these checked records go over a specific limit, banks must inform the controller who will then investigate means to find any potential tax evasion openings.
Countries in Asia are apparently either embracing cryptocurrencies or adopting a hard line strategy against them. Taiwan is still on the moderate side, while Japan, Hong Kong, and Singapore remain centers for the blockchain and cryptocurrency enterprises. On the opposite side are nations like China, and additionally India and Thailand, who have imposed bans on cryptocurrency trading and cracked down on ICOs.
Analysts believe that when China imposed its ban on the crypto market, that a lot in the industry fled to Taiwan. It is also believed that a lot of Taiwanese had invested in the Chinese crypto market. So with Beijing’s move to ban cryptocurrencies, Taiwan is seen as a natural contender to pick up the mantle in the region.
