South Korea Requires Crypto Exchanges to Verify Assets Every 5 Minutes to Strengthen Internal Controls

Odaily News: The Financial Services Commission (FSC) of South Korea announced on Monday that, in response to the internal control vulnerabilities exposed by the recent Bithumb payment incident, it has required all domestic cryptocurrency exchanges to implement a ledger-to-actual asset verification every 5 minutes.

An emergency inspection revealed that three of the top five domestic exchanges only reconciled their accounts once a day, making it difficult to promptly identify and address discrepancies; some systems were unable to automatically halt trading in the event of significant mismatches, raising regulatory concerns.

According to the new regulations:

1. Exchanges must establish an automated ledger-wallet reconciliation system with a cycle of five minutes.

2. Set standards for triggering automatic trading suspensions in the event of significant discrepancies.

3. High-risk processes (such as promotional payments) must undergo enhanced review, including third-party verification and multi-level approval.

4. High-risk accounts must be managed independently, and payments must utilize automated verification tools.

5. The frequency of external audits will be increased from quarterly to monthly, with the disclosure scope expanded to include detailed asset balances by wallet and ledger.

The FSC stated that it will complete the revision of relevant rules by April 2026. Previously, Bithumb announced that its IPO plan has been postponed until after 2028 to allow for strengthened internal controls and accounting policies by 2027; concurrently, the equity swap between Naver Financial and Dunamu has also been postponed until the end of September. (Cointelegraph)