Last week, Tipsuda Thavaramara, The Thai Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) deputy secretary-general re-introduced digital shares issuance and tokenized securities in the recent regulation.

According to the secretary-general, under the amended Securities and Exchange Act of 2019, the SEC is asking all stakeholders to prepare for the act, which is designed to promote both Thailand’s capital market to new participants and blockchain use in digital trade.

One important change in the regulation is allowing scripless transactions to cover the primary market for all types of securities, which was previously applied only to the secondary market. Scripless transactions only require book entries without a physical certificate for holding and settlement. Thavaramara considered this as a chance for opening the tokenized securities system: “This change will have a major impact as the amended Act provides a legal basis to support [the country’s capital market] the tokenisation platform.”

Furthermore, with the law improvement, more opportunities are opened for additional market players and support entirely digital shares to authorize tokenized securities depository platform and the issuance of digital shares in the primary market.

Back in February, Thailand’s National Legislative Assembly has accepted the issuance of tokenized securities on blockchain, setting the stage for the legal introduction of tokenized securities, as well as further liberalization of its overall securities market such as issuing scripless securities.

Last March, Thailand’s Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has approved its first initial coin offering (ICO) “portal”, which assists in vetting ICOs.