Thailand Announces Official ICO Regulations and Approves 7 Cryptocurrencies

Thailand was shuffling between the lines of what was right and what was wrong for initial coin offerings (ICOs). Confusion will stop now as Thailand’s Securities and Exchange Commision (SEC) has come up with a regulatory framework for the ever so controversial ICO’s.

The new guidelines will be in official effect from July 16th. Under it, every ICO issuer will have to register for approval with a minimum registered capital of 5 million baht which is roughly equal to $150,000.

ICO Operators will be able to offer unlimited tokens to investors such as institutional, venture capitalists, private equity firms, and ultra high net worth individuals. However retail investors will be capped at 300,000 bath which is about $9,050.

Only seven cryptocurrencies will be accepted in the Thai framework. These include – Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple, Bitcoin Cash, Ethereum Classic, Stellar and Litecoin. The Thai Baht will be the only fiat recognized for ICO investments.

ICO’s will go through a stringent process. The SEC will check internal details such as the previous history of investments by the company and its founders along with its financial statements. Even the source code of the ICO will be examined. The SEC will study the ICO structure to establish if its trustworthy enough to be passed.

ICO issuers will have to go through an ICO portal (company) process, the latter which will need to be pre-approved by the SEC.

Thailand’s SEC secretary-general, Rapee Sucharitakul stated-

“The SEC is pleased to immediately discuss details with those who would like to be approved as ICO portals in order for them to be prepared for the regulatory framework. After the SEC approves an ICO portal, the token will be assessed for approval.”

As of now, there are about 50 ICO projects in line to seek approval with 5 ICO’s almost finalized.

Much has been said about ICO’s so far, with the United State’s SEC chairman Jay Clayton reaffirming that ICO’s should be considered ‘securities.’