The Philippines’ Securities and Exchanges Commission (SEC) has warned its citizens against using unregistered cryptocurrency exchanges. The SEC warned amidst “the recent collapse of a large international cryptocurrency exchange,” without specifically mentioning the collapsed FTX exchange. Any enterprise wishing to conduct business in the nation must register with the SEC, the government agency reaffirmed, citing national regulations.
“SEC is the registrar and overseer of the Philippine corporate sector; it supervises more than 600,000 active corporations and evaluates the financial statements (FS) filed by all corporations registered with it,” said SEC in its advisory.
The SEC claims that several exchanges are using social media and online advertisements to specifically target Filipino investors. Additionally, the government body emphasised that the exchanges currently “unlawfully allow” Filipinos to access their platforms and enable the opening of accounts online. According to the SEC, these exchanges “offer different products and schemes which are high-risk and occasionally fraudulent.”
The SEC issued a warning to local investors on August 4 not to use the Binance crypto after identifying it. The exchange does not have a licence to solicit investments, according to the SEC. Even after this, the exchange was still optimistic that they would be able to infiltrate the nation.
Similar advice was given to local investors by Banko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP), the nation’s central bank, on August 19. The BSP warned Filipino individuals to avoid using foreign virtual asset service providers who are based abroad and are not authorized to operate in their country. The central bank claims that when dealing with such enterprises, it would be challenging to implement any consumer protection laws and legal remedies.