Some of major Japanese exchanges including bitFlyer, Japan’s biggest and best-funded crypto trading platform, are facing business improvement orders from the country’s financial regulator.
At least five cryptocurrency exchange operators receive ‘business improvement orders’ from Japan’s Financial Services Agency (FSA).
The five exchanges on the FSA’s whipping list are notably registered with the regulator to operate a domestic trading platform in the country. They include bitFlyer, Quoine, Bitbank, BitPoint Japan and BtcBox
The FSA discovered ‘flaws’ in the exchanges’ internal management systems at a time when their holdings of customer assets increase exponentially. Those flaws reportedly include reporting procedures to flag suspicious transactions that could reveal instances of money laundering, according to the FSA investigation. Those business improvement orders are expected to be handed down by the regulator by the end of the week.
The regulator began ‘spot checks’ across a number of exchanges, both registered and unregistered, in February. The FSA soon discovered a number of ‘legitimate’ concerns including lax security standards used in exchanges, a lack of experts employed to look into internal auditing and cybersecurity measures, among others.
