Indonesia launches a new crypto exchange and expectations of Southeast Asian countries about this trillion-dollar market

On July 17^th Indonesia, Bappebti - Indonesia's commodity futures trading watchdog, announced that the country will open its national cryptocurrency exchange in July 2023, local news outlet Tempo reported.

Here is fantastic news and convincing evidence for the great future of the cryptocurrency market not only for this nation but also for all the others in Southeast Asia.

However, whether the above good news will bring any difficulties to the development of the cryptocurrency market of the countries in the region? Let’s find out with FinFan in this article.

The advantages for Indonesian crypto fans when this country launches a new national crypto exchange

According to Bappebti – the organization takes responsibility to open this national crypto exchange, they do this because of the increasing of scams in the crypto market in this country.

Didid Noordiatmoko, the head of Bappebti, said that all cryptocurrency transactions in Indonesia will have to go through the national exchange with a built-in application form, which has been tested and validated.

By launching a government-regulated exchange, Indonesia aims to provide a safe and transparent platform for cryptocurrency trading in this country.

Moreover, Mr. Noordiatmoko also emphasized that this exchange should have been launched in 2021 because of the extremely strong growth (over 1000% in this year) of the total crypto trading volume in this country.

Until now, although the heads of the Indonesian government have not accepted cryptocurrency as a new payment, Indonesian crypto fans still have hope for this country's digital finance in the future after that launched crypto exchange decision from them.

Have countries with developed digital technology in the region had solutions similar to Indonesia?

With the good news for the crypto market not only in Indonesia but also across the region being released, let's look at the development of the crypto market in some countries in the region.

The cryptocurrency market in Singapore

According to the statistics & facts of Statista, in 2022, the blockchain and cryptocurrency sectors accounted for the largest share of fintech companies in Singapore. As part of its strategy to develop the sector, the government has focused on regulating and attracting players in the crypto environment.

Indeed, the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has taken a proactive approach to developing cryptocurrency-related activities, implementing regulations to maintain control over the industry. As of December 2022, MAS had authorized 11 cryptocurrency service providers, nine of which hold a major payment institution license and two of which hold a standard payment institution license.

These include local companies such as Crypto.com, Coinhako, and Genesis. Especially these themselves are all cryptocurrency exchanges.

Like the Indonesian government, the Singapore government also has much skepticism about these digital assets due to their volatile and speculative nature. Therefore, even though it has licensed the operation of the above cryptocurrency exchanges, the government still has moved to tighten strict control over them and is putting a prohibition when they advertise directly to individuals (only reluctant to accept some retailers).

The cryptocurrency market in Malaysia

If the Singapore cryptocurrency market fears being affected by some factors of money laundering or economic manipulation by crypto. In Malaysia, they are not only afraid of that too but also of terrorism. Because of this market's great support for free trade between parties, terrorists will take advantage of that loophole from it.

Although cryptocurrency exchanges have been trying to use strong cybersecurity measures such as eKYC (electric know your customer) to limit the above problems, globally, crypto scams amounted to US$14 billion in 2021 (this number continues to increase over the years), and in Malaysia, victims are losing increasingly larger sums.

Somehow, the cryptocurrency market still has to continue to grow in this country to solve the financial problems for more than 55% of the population that is classified as unbanked and underbanked.

The cryptocurrency market in Vietnam

For more than 25% of the population earning crypto assets, Vietnam is ranked 3^rd on the statistic of the Number of crypto owners by countries 2023 (from the newest report of Statista).

However, although the adoption of cryptocurrency by the citizen is still high (1^st rank in the world), this still hasn’t been taken the adoption of the government.

According to an article on Statista’s page of Minh Ngoc Nguyen, nevertheless, all cryptocurrencies still face the challenge of not being recognized as either a legitimate payment form or as a type of property in Vietnam, hence, the exchange of these assets has yet to be legal.

While Vietnamese investors still trade and use crypto assets using international platforms, their activities are potentially subjected to legal fines, and their investments are neither taxable nor protected by Vietnamese laws.

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In short, Indonesia's approval of the issue of opening a nationwide cryptocurrency exchange is a new step for the overall development of the cryptocurrency industry of the whole Southeast Asia region.

Although there are still many problems related to the law and the approval of cryptocurrency as a new payment method, the people of Southeast Asia in general and Vietnam in particular still firmly believe in a future of no centralized payment through blockchain technology across the region.