South Korean Representative Kim Nam-kuk’s political party, the National Democratic Party, has urged him to sell all of his digital assets and will launch an investigation into his token trading practices.
Two years ago, some of his undisclosed positions were exposed by various Asian media. Blockworks is unaware of Kim’s current holdings, but reports say he owned about 800,000 wemix tokens in 2021, worth about $4.5 million at the time.
Kim may withdraw all his Wemix tokens before South Korea’s travel rules come into force in March 2022. According to Yonhap News Agency, the rule requires all exchanges in the country to flag cryptocurrency transfers exceeding 1 million won (about $757).
Kwon Chil-seung, a top spokesman for the Democratic Party, is confident Kim will follow the advice of investigators and his colleagues.
“As we advised him to sell his crypto holdings, we are confident that he will comply,” Kwon told reporters.
In addition to charges that he withdrew all of his tokens before key travel rules stymied his efforts, Kim also co-sponsored legislation that would delay income tax on crypto assets in July 2021.
In the US, unlike Kim, Senator Ted Cruz voluntarily disclosed his bitcoin purchases. The Texas Republican bought assets worth between $15,001 and $50,000, according to Senate financial disclosures.
More recently, Cruz said he is “very bullish” on bitcoin and cryptocurrencies more broadly. He added that he has a standing buy every Monday.
“I own a little over 2 bitcoins, and every Monday I have a little bit more,” Cruz said.
This comes as 2024 presidential candidates begin sharing their visions for cryptocurrencies with American voters, including how they plan to regulate the industry.
Democratic candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. tweeted that President Joe Biden’s 30 percent tax on electricity used for cryptocurrency mining is “a bad idea.”
President Biden’s most recent foray into cryptocurrency regulation came on Tuesday, when he tweeted that if Congress closes a tax loophole to help “wealthy cryptocurrency investors,” it would bring in $18 billion for the government.
Most of the other candidates have yet to comment on their plans to regulate bitcoin and the larger cryptocurrency space.
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