In a major development, a regulated market for tokenized securities in South Korea is finally taking shape. Ahead of a broader legal framework due to take effect in February 2027, the Financial Services Commission (FSC) has released detailed draft rules governing how these digital-form securities will be issued and traded.The consultation period opened October 2 and runs through November 11. During this window, the FSC is gathering feedback on which securities qualify for tokenization, the technical standards distributed ledgers must meet, financial and staffing thresholds for issuers that manage customer accounts directly, and a newly created license for over-the-counter trading venues.Stocks, bonds and investment funds are among the traditional asset classes that could be issued and traded in tokenized form under the plan. The framework also extends to fractional investment products such as non-monetary trust beneficiary certificates and investment contract securities. Rather than creating a separate legal category for crypto-style assets, regulators are classifying tokenized securities as ordinary securities subject to existing rules. This means issuers will go through the same registration process used today and operate under the current capital-markets law. Not everything will be tradable the moment the rules take effect. South Korea’s earlier roadmap splits the rollout into three stages, and the opening phase is narrower than the eventual goal. It covers privately pooled money-market funds and bonds aimed at institutional investors, unlisted shares held through trust arrangements, and fractional investment securities offered to the public. Full access to all publicly offered securities is planned for a later stage of the rollout.The legal basis for this shift was set earlier this year. In January, the FSC confirmed that lawmakers had passed amendments to the Electronic Registration Act and the Financial Investment Services and Capital Markets Act, formally recognizing distributed ledgers as valid securities registries.Debt securities are getting their own OTC license category under the new proposal, adding to categories already planned for unlisted shares and trust beneficiary certificates. Regulators hope this will encourage more retail activity in debt instruments, a segment where individual investors currently trade relatively little. To protect those investors, the FSC wants to cap annual net purchases at KRW100 million per OTC exchange, a figure calculated by subtracting a year’s sales from a year’s purchases on each platform. That cap has already drawn pushback from industry participants, who have asked regulators to reconsider it during the consultation process.Issuers that plan to manage customer accounts themselves would need to meet a minimum equity requirement of 4 billion Korean won, or about $2.8 million, along with staffing dedicated to compliance and technology functions. Whether that capital threshold or the distributed-ledger technical requirements should be eased remains an open question.How to Use UPI to Buy US Stocks from IndiaSwyftx vs Digital Surge: Which is the Best Crypto Exchange in Australia?10 Best Call Center SoftwareStella(ALPHA Crypto): A Crypto Leveraged Strategies Protocol