- South Korea elected pro-crypto candidate Lee Jae-myung as president with 49.42% of the vote, pledging to legalise spot crypto ETFs and advance stalled digital asset regulations.
- Lee’s win ends Yoon Suk-yeol’s term, whose own crypto efforts failed amid resistance from regulators. Lee may benefit from the FSC’s now-softening stance.
- In the Czech Republic, Justice Minister Pavel Blazek resigned over a US$45M BTC donation tied to a convicted drug trafficker, prompting the ANO party to push for a no-confidence vote.
South Korea has elected Lee Jae-myung as its new president, officially ending Yoon Suk-yeol’s controversial three-year tenure.
Lee, representing the left-wing Democratic Party, secured 49.42% of the vote in Tuesday’s election, defeating conservative challenger Kim Moon-soo, who took 41.15%. Voter turnout reached 79.4%, the highest in nearly three decades.
While Lee inherits a fragile economy and a fractured political landscape, he promised in his speech to address the country’s economic challenges. Though he didn’t mention crypto, he pledged to advance the country’s stalled crypto agenda during the presidential campaign.
Among Lee’s crypto pledges is a renewed effort to legalise spot cryptocurrency exchange-traded funds (ETFs), which remain banned in South Korea despite growing interest. Financial regulators have hinted at reevaluation following the success of US-based crypto ETFs, but no local product has yet been approved.
Related: Strategy Doubles Down on Bitcoin, Adds 705 BTC for US$75 Million
His administration plans to finish the second phase of South Korea’s digital asset regulatory framework, legislation that will focus on regulating stablecoins and mandating transparency standards for crypto exchanges.
Former president Yoon tried to pivot into crypto as well, attempting to deregulate the sector but failed to deliver due to internal resistance and a few political challenges, so to speak, particularly from the Financial Services Commission (FSC).
But just like in the United States and the SEC, the FSC is now showing a more flexible stance, so maybe Lee will be able to work on deregulation and actually bring innovation forward for the country.
Meanwhile, in the Czech Republic…
Over in Europe, the Czech opposition party ANO triggered a no-confidence vote against the ruling government following the resignation of Justice Minister Pavel Blazek over a Bitcoin (BTC) donation linked to a convicted drug trafficker.
Blazek stepped down Friday as a result. The donation was worth around US$45M (AU$69M), traced back to Tomas Jirikovsky, an operator of the defunct dark web marketplace Sheep Marketplace convicted in 2017 for facilitating illegal drug sales. The scandal started when the ministry’s official X account shared that the BTC was sold at a public auction.
Blazek denied legal misconduct, stating he had no capacity to investigate the origin of the donation and saw little relevance in reopening a case nearly a decade old.
Related: NBX Makes History as Norway’s First Public Company to Hold Bitcoin
Opposition leaders seized on the scandal to launch a formal no-confidence vote. During a national television appearance cited by Reuters, Karel Havlicek, deputy chief of the populist ANO party, said the government should have resigned immediately.
Credit: Source link
