South Korea’s regulatory body urges use of blockchain for a stock exchange

South Korea’s financial regulatory authority released a report in which it advocates the use of blockchain technology to build a stock trading platform.

The country’s Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) called on the local regulatory authorities and blockchain firms to partner in developing an integrated blockchain system to replace the traditional centralised infrastructure used to track stock trading transactions. The FSS says the conventional methods are both less efficient and more vulnerable to security breaches.

The federal regulating body concludes that an unhackable blockchain-powered trading platform would bolster the efficiency, integrity and security of tracking and storing transactions.

Still in early stages

The FSS, however, accepts that the country’s embrace of the open ledger technology is still in its early stages, in spite of the success of significant pilot projects which include a seven-month experiment of the imports and exports from South Korean shipping ports.

Before elaborating its report, the FSS took a careful look at the ways international stock exchanges are currently using blockchain technology, such as those in the United States, Japan, United Kingdom and Australia.

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The FSS made a particular analysis of the Nasdaq and they way its using blockchain to maintain records. It also analysed how the London Stock Exchange is using a blockchain-based platform to issue private shares.

Regulation is positive for crypto

The head of the FSS, Yoon Suk-heun, said a couple of months ago that he sees a few positive things in cryptocurrency and added that regulation “would produce” the secure financial system that would make them more accessible.