For several months, the Thai government has been hard at work formulating amenable laws for its cryptospace. In what seems like a flawless victory for cryptocurrency investors in the country, authorities have now officially confirmed that the previously stated ICO regulation takes effect on July 16, 2018.

ICOs to be Thoroughly Screened

According to the Thai SEC statement, there will be dedicated portals for prospective ICO organizers to submit their projects for vetting. Once approved, the ICO vetting portal would, in turn, forward the list to the Thai Securities and Exchange Commission for final screening.

In February 2018, the Securities and Exchange Commission of Thailand and the Stock Exchange of Thailand intensified efforts to formulate comprehensive laws that would govern the country’s ICO industry, after a successful stakeholders meeting earlier in January 2018.

At the time, the authorities made it clear to all that it fully supports ICOs as a means of fundraising for startups and would, therefore, enact laws that would create a balance in the system.

“The SEC Thailand encourages access to funding for businesses, including high potential tech startups, and realizes the potential of ICO in answering startups’ funding needs,” the Thai SEC noted at the time.

In May 2018, the SEC declared that cryptocurrencies are digital assets, as such all firms handling virtual currencies must get registered with the agency within 90 days.

Thailand’s Cryptocurrency Push

Interestingly, the recognition of cryptos as digital assets laid a solid foundation for the Thai ICO ecosystem and on June 16, BTCManager reported that authorities had approved 5 ICO applications that would commence operations once the regulation takes effect.

That is not all; the agency also made it clear to ICO organizers that their projects must have real use cases and only seven established cryptos – bitcoin, ether, XRP, litecoin, stellar, ethereum classic and bitcoin cash – could be used as trading pairs.

Also, under the outline, the regulators noted that ICO operators would be allowed to offer a limitless number of tokens to institutional investors, venture capitals, private equity firms and individuals with very high net-worth; while a token value of only 300,000 baht ($9,050) is allowed for retail investors.

Importantly, all prospective ICO organizers are required to have an SEC-approved company registered in the country with a base capital of at least  5 million baht, an equivalent of $150,000.