Thailand’s Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has recommended the country’s Finance Ministry to revoke the digital asset exchange license of Huobi (Thailand) Co, which is accused of failing to fix system flaws.
Announced on Saturday, the financial regulator is pushing the exchange to suspend its services and return clients’ funds within the next three months.
The decision did not come as a surprise as the SEC had multiple meetings with Huobi representatives, pointing out the flaws on the exchanges. In reviews conducted last February and March, the regulator found flaws in the exchange’s management structure and platform, which violated the local regulations.
One of the Few Thai Crypto Exchanges
Huobi (Thailand) is the Thai affiliate of the global crypto exchange, Huobi. The Thai unit gained the mandatory license in July 2019, becoming one of the few crypto exchanges to operate in the country.
The latest announcement detailed that the SEC had already asked Huobi to fix the flaws on the Thai exchange in a meeting held on March 19. In a consecutive meeting in April, the financial market regulator asked the exchange to suspend its services and return clients’ funds, until the issues were not rectified within a set deadline. However, Huobi kept asking for an extension of the deadline.
The latest recommendation to revoke Huobi’s license came after the exchange failed to rectify the critical flaws even after five months of the initial warning.
The Thai SEC is becoming very strict in regulating the local crypto exchanges. As the global regulators started to issue warnings against Binance, the Thai regulator went a step further and lodged a criminal complaint against the exchange.
Meanwhile, the Spanish securities markets regulator issued a warning against 10 companies last month that include the names of two popular global crypto exchanges, Huobi and Bybit.
