South Korean media reports that a high-ranking member of the ruling party is involved in a conflict of interest related to cryptocurrency regulation: his son interned at Bithumb while criticizing Upbit.

Odaily Planet Daily reports that Kim Byung-ki, the floor leader of South Korea's ruling Democratic Party, is facing pressure to resign. Multiple South Korean media outlets have revealed that while the National Assembly was pushing for criticism of Upbit, South Korea's largest cryptocurrency exchange, his son was interning at competitor Bithumb, raising concerns about a potential conflict of interest. According to a former aide to Kim Byung-ki, at his request, his team launched a concentrated attack at the National Assembly level on Upbit's operator, Dunamu, accusing it of monopolistic practices in the domestic cryptocurrency exchange market. This instruction reportedly occurred in February of this year, when Kim Byung-ki was still a member of the National Assembly's Political Affairs Committee, which has direct oversight authority over financial institutions and cryptocurrency exchanges.

NewsTapa, an investigative media outlet, previously reported that Kim Byung-ki's son was placed in an internship at Bithumb's data analytics team shortly after a private meeting between Kim Byung-ki and Bithumb executives in November 2024. In the following weeks, Kim Byung-ki repeatedly criticized a "trading platform with a market monopoly" at committee meetings, without naming it, but this was widely interpreted as referring to Upbit. However, Kim Byung-ki himself has denied the conflict of interest allegations, emphasizing that his remarks stemmed from his principled opposition to market monopolies, and that his son's employment was "completely unrelated" to his legislative and regulatory activities. (DL News)