Look no further than South Korea!

What was starting to become one of the major hubs of bitcoin trading got some rather harsh news last night.

Well it wasn't actually all that harsh, but apparently those selling bitcoin think so.

In news out last night in South Korea, regulators have announced that they will be regulating cryptocurrency exchanges.

What does that mean?

It likely means several things.

The big requirement going forward will be that exchanges will be required to verify their customers before allowing them to trade, which would go along with rules other financial exchanges abide by in the country.

That doesn't sound all that bad.

What was likely scary was the part where regulators said that they might also shut down some exchanges that are not abiding by these rules.

Which as you can imagine read like, "oh no exchanges are going to be shut down!".

Luckily that is not the case.

However, some quotes from the government also didn't help ease the concerns felt by traders and investors:

“Cryptocurrency speculation has been irrationally overheated in Korea.”

“The government can’t leave the abnormal situation of speculation any longer.”

Overall it didn't sound like that big of changes would be coming, but at a time when bitcoin trading has already been weak, it seems like it is looking for excuses to sell off right now.

In fact, Cedric Jeanson, the CEO of BitSpread, said that not only did he think not that big of changes would be coming, but he actually thought the changes that did come would ultimately be good for the industry.

He felt that regulations were needed and would give investors more confidence to enter the space, which would only increase trading volumes going forward.