Reports said that Thailand’s oldest bank Siam Commercial Bank’s SCB X Group is expected to buy a 51% stake in Thailand-based crypto exchange Bitkub for 17.85 billion baht (around $536.7 million) by the second quarter of 2022.
It has been reported that the exchange said the deal is subject to approval from the Thai Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the country’s central bank.
Arthit Nanthawittaya, the CEO of Siam Commercial Bank, said that the acquisition was based on the growth of businesses in the digital asset space over the last two years and the expected value in the long term.
However, the company hinted at aiming to strengthen and grow the digital asset ecosystem in Thailand.
Jirayut Srupsrisopa, the founder and CEO of Bitkub, said:
“Bitkub has reached the point where we have become an important structure in Thailand’s future economy. Bitkub is no longer just a startup. It is becoming necessary infrastructure for the financial industry 3.0 in Thailand.”
The report said that Bitkub is one of the few crypto exchanges in Thailand operating with the approval of the country’s SEC. After releasing revised crypto regulations in November 2020, the financial regulator ordered the exchange to suspend services and fix issues regarding outages during periods of high demand.
Likewise, regulators in Thailand have issued a number of guidelines for individual crypto traders and businesses. In June, SEC officials issued a notice that Thai exchanges were banned from handling meme-based tokens, fan-based tokens, nonfungible tokens (NFTs), and exchange-issued tokens.
Thus, the regulatory body also proposed a set of guidelines in August related to the custody of investors’ cryptocurrency holdings held by digital asset business operators.
Source: Cointelegraph