Seoul: The chief of the country’s financial watchdog said Tuesday that virtual asset market operators are urged to beef up their market monitoring to better safeguard consumers.

According to Yonhap News Agency, in a meeting with the heads of Dunamu, Coinone, and eight other virtual asset exchange operators, Lee Chan-jin, governor of the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS), emphasized that fairness and transparency are essential in the virtual market. He urged market operators to focus on providing trust-based financial products and services rather than pursuing short-term profits, which could lead to market distortion.

Lee addressed concerns about data breaches in the financial sector, highlighting the need for virtual market operators to enhance their market monitoring systems and information technology (IT) infrastructure. This improvement is necessary to detect market distortion and better protect customers.

Recent data indicated that the value of South Korea’s virtual asset market reached 95.1 trillion won (US$67.8 billion) as of end-June. The country hosts 25 virtual asset market operators, including 17 crypto exchanges, with the number of market users standing at 10.77 million in June.