South Korean media reported that Democratic Party lawmaker Kim Nam-kuk previously co-sponsored a bill aimed at deferring taxation on crypto profits.
South Korea’s financial watchdog reported a series of crypto transactions by an opposition lawmaker to local prosecutors, sparking anger within the country over a potential conflict of interest. According to CoinDesk Korea, Representative Kim Nam-kuk of the Democratic Party of Korea allegedly pulled 800,000 WEMIX tokens from late February to early March 2022, and the transactions were reported to the Financial Services Commission’s Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU).
Who Claims He Didn’t Turn Assets Into Cash
Kim’s WEMIX assets were recorded at 6 billion won between January and February 2022. The report stated that the FIU classified the withdrawals as suspicious transactions and reported it to the prosecutor’s office.
South Korea implemented the global standard-setting FATF’s travel rule on March 25, 2022, shortly after Kim processed the withdrawals. The travel rule requires exchanges to collect personal data about transactions and notify authorities when they exceed a certain threshold.
According to the report, Kim said he did not cash out his tokens and did not violate any laws.
South Korea’s Civil Service Code of Ethics does not have any reporting requirements for virtual assets. WEMIX was scrapped from major exchanges in South Korea last year for allegedly reporting false circulating supplies. The issuing company, WeMade, challenged the delisting in court, but this attempt was unsuccessful.
According to CoinDesk Korea, Kim co-sponsored an amendment to the Income Tax Law in July 2021 that included a provision to defer taxation of virtual assets.
Alongside this, South Korea has postponed its plans to tax income from crypto as well as income from the transfer or lending of virtual assets until 2025.
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