Police crypto custody bid in South Korea draws criticism for favoring large exchanges

South Korea's National Police Agency has launched its fourth bid for a custodian to manage seized virtual assets, but small and medium-sized firms are reluctant to participate, Edaily reported. According to a notice on the country's Public Procurement Service KONEPS system, the agency recently opened bidding for its "Seized Virtual Asset Storage and Management Project," with a deadline of June 24. The project's budget has been increased 3.2-fold to 267 million won from the previous 83 million won. However, critics argue that the bidding process is structured to favor large, won-denominated cryptocurrency exchanges. They point out that smaller custody providers find it difficult to meet stringent requirements, such as 100% full compensation and 24-hour real-time support, and that there are no bidding restrictions based on company size.