Binance's acquisition of Gopax faces difficulties, with customer deposits held hostage.

As Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, faces difficulties in acquiring the domestic virtual asset exchange Gopax, it has played a "hardball" card. Binance has threatened that unless financial authorities approve its acquisition of Gopax, it will be unable to return the 50 billion KRW in customer assets tied up in Gopax.
 

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Pureun “Ian” Hong, managing partner at Decent Law Firm, which specializes in virtual assets, stated, "According to Article 7, Paragraph 3 of the Special Financial Information Act, a virtual asset service provider cannot have its registration accepted if it has a criminal record, such as being fined for financial-related crimes in Korea." He further explained, "Binance is currently under pressure from the U.S., so while it may not be easy to punish the company under domestic law, if the authorities take this into account, they could exercise discretion and reject the registration change of the board of directors.