The Finance Ministry of the Thai Government has issued licenses to four digital asset based firms dealing in cryptocurrency as per a report published by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) of Thailand. The name of the companies that secured the licenses are Bitkub Online Co., cryptocurrency brokerage firm Coins TH Co., Bitcoin Exchange Co. which is a digital asset exchanges and Satang Corporation.
One more application which is filed by the Coin Asset Co., to run a digital exchange is currently under consideration. As per a news agency, the company is changing their leadership team. As of now, the firm is given the green signal to continue with its normal operations as the Ministry of Finance is exploring the changes in the leadership team.
Additionally, two other firms which applied for licenses earlier last year, have not been issued the licenses. They are Southeast Asia Digital Exchange Co. (SEADEX) And Cash2coin. The reason is not complying with the criteria for filing licenses with the SEC.
As per the notice, both the companies mentioned above were directed to cease their operations due to the rejections of their applications. However, this would be in effect from 14th Jan’19. Till then they can continue with the normal operations.
Last year, in August, the Ministry of Finance approved seven business entities to operate on the platform of digital assets in an endeavor to structure the country’s crypto market at a domestic level. As an awareness, the regulator of the financial market issued directives to the public for avoiding unlicensed crypto trading platform to protect them from the various online threats associated with trading of cryptocurrency. In the past, almost fifty ICO or Initial Coin Offering companies expressed their interest in procuring licenses for their operation in the crypto industry as revealed by the Securities and Exchange Commission of Thailand. Since then, the number of firms showing interest in digital asset has also gone up. ICO is an unregulated method of fundraising to support a new project via cryptocurrency. An Initial Coin Offering is used by start-ups to avoid the strict and over-regulated capital-raising process required by venture capitalists or banks. In an ICO campaign, a percentage of the cryptocurrency is sold to enthusiasts of the project in return for governmental means of payment or other cryptocurrencies, often Bitcoin.
ICOs shares features of both IPOs and crowdfunding. Like IPOs, a stake of the start-up or company is sold to raise money for the entity’s operations during an ICO operation. However, while IPOs deal with investors, ICOs deal with supporters, just like a crowdfunding campaign the only difference is that the backers of the ICO project are motivated by a future return of their investments, while the funds raised during crowdfunding are just gratuitous contributions.
