Finance
Amendment to the Payment Services Act Tightens
Regulation of Crypto Assets
The Payment Services Act ("PSA") and the Financial
Instruments and Exchange Act ("FIEA") were amended on May
31, 2019 ("Amendment"). The Amendment was promulgated on
June 7, 2019.
Pursuant to a May 2016 amendment to the PSA, Japan had
introduced one of the first regulations on virtual currencies in
the world (please see the
June 2016 issue of this newsletter). However, a series
of incidents where customers' virtual currencies held at
exchange service providers were misappropriated triggered criticism
that the regulations should afford additional protections to
customers and be further clarified. The main objective of the
Amendment is to tighten regulations on virtual currencies.
