Crypto-friendly Yoon Suk-yeol wins Sth Korean presidency, ICX surges 60%

cointelegraph.com:

Conservative South Korean presidential candidate Yoon Suk-yeol has officially been elected as South Korea’s next president.

The election was one of the closest in South Korean history, according to BBC coverage, which saw Yoon, representing the conservative People Power Party, claim victory over his more politically progressive opponent, Lee Jae-myung, by a margin of less than 1%.

Cryptocurrency played a leading role in South Korea’s election debate, with both candidates releasing campaign-related NFTs. Their crypto-sympathetic stances are in opposition to former-President Moon Jae-In’s crackdown on crypto exchanges last year, and helped curry favor with the younger, more crypto enthusiastic demographic.

Speaking at a virtual asset forum in January, Yoon promised to deregulate South Korea’s crypto industry, establishing his forward-thinking stance on digital assets.

Continuing his plans for crypto-positive developments pending his election, Yoon stated that he wished to help create blockchain-tech related “unicorns” (startups that grow to be worth $1 billion or more) in South Korea.

Yoon has also promised to introduce some form of legislation that would see crypto profits gained from illicit activity returned to its victims.

In a possibly related development cryptocurrency Icon (ICX) the native token of the South Korean ICON blockchain, surged 60% in the past 12 hours. It's pulled back a little but was still up 40% at the time of writing. Yoon famously minted his signature on the blockchain at a televised start up forum in Dec. last year.

South-Korean presidential candidate Yoon Seokryul visited the ICONLOOP office today.As the Korea Startup Forum held its heavily televized start-up policy talk, Yoon Seokryul went on to