Upbit — one of South Korea’s largest crypto exchanges — will suspend deposits and withdrawals of digital assets of more than 1 million Korean won ($721).

The move comes in response to changes to the virtual asset service provider (VASP) Ten&Ten, one of the local facilitators of deposits and withdrawals.

In an April 17 announcement, Upbit said the suspension of use and termination of Ten&Ten’s Travel Rule Solution service is the reason behind its decision to halt deposits and withdrawals.

The Ten&Ten exchange services stopped transaction support on April 15, and the last date to withdraw crypto assets is April 22 at 10:00 am Korea Standard Time.

Ten&Ten helped the crypto exchange offer crypto deposits and withdrawals of over 1 million won. Other VASPs that allow deposits and withdrawals over 1 million won include Bblock, Gopax, FlatExchange, Aprobit, Prabang, Borabit, BTX, Flybit, Foblegate, Bithumb, Coinone, Korbit, Coredocs, GDAC, Hanbitco, Qbit, Korea Digital Asset Trust and Oasis Exchange.

In a report released on April 10, the European Union named Upbit second in market share after Binance, with approximately 528.57 billion in trading volume.

In the first quarter of 2024, the South Korean won surpassed the United States dollar in crypto trading volume. According to Kaiko data, transactions in Korean won on centralized exchanges totaled over $456 billion, slightly exceeding the U.S. dollar's cumulative volume of around $455 billion.

Currently, South Korean financial authorities plan to release new guidelines imposing tighter regulations for token listings on centralized crypto exchanges by the end of April or, at the latest, early May.

Authorities will also prohibit listing digital assets with hacking incidents on domestic exchanges unless the root cause is thoroughly determined.

The 24-hour trading volume at Upbit fell to $3.8 billion at the start of April after reaching a high earlier in March. On March 5, Upbit recorded a daily trading volume of almost $15 billion, the exchange’s highest trading volume of 2024 so far.

The crypto exchange’s surge in daily trading volume may be attributed to Bitcoin reaching a new all-time high of $69,200 on the same day.

Hong Kong’s financial regulator has reportedly approved three spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds, which are expected to list on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in approximately two weeks.

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