India’s Reserve bank, the RBI, just announced that there are no restrictions in providing banking services for crypto traders. This lifts a cloud that has been hanging over the crypto market and could spur another Bull Run eventually for cryptocurrency. India’s 1.35 billion people could soon have access to cryptocurrency trading.
Tag: india
Indian Supreme Court order RBI to answer complaints
India’s Supreme Court has ordered the Reserve Bank of India to answer complaints within 2 weeks levied by the country’s crypto industry about the banking ban on Crypto. This ban has devastated the country’s crypto industry and made several exchange shut down. This might be the first speck of hope and light for India to not shut down crypto operations entirely.
India’s Crypto ban claims another Exchange
India’s Coinome has announced that it will cease operations on May 15th and has encouraged all its customers to withdraw their crypto. This is the 3rd such exchange to close down in India since the RBI imposed its ban last July. Zebpay was shut down last October due to the regulations, Coindelta was shuttered in April and now Coinome is the next Victim in line. Unocoin may be next as it has said that it only has until July before liquidity dries up. Unocoin has reduced its staff down to 14 people and may be forced out of India unless regulations change soon.
Indian Government plans to ban crypto altogether
The Indian government has drafted a proposal to ban cryptocurrencies altogether which will be voted on in May or June. This would be a devastating move to crypto companies located inside the country such as nCash but also be really bad for remittance cryptos like XRP or XLM as India is one of the largest, if not the largest market for remittances.
India Best-funded crypto exchange running out of money
The Reserve Bank of India’s Ban on cryptocurrencies for its banks is taking a heavy toll on crypto exchanges in the country and many have had to either move out or close. Today, it was reported that Unocoin, the best funded crypto exchange in India, has let go of some of its staff and is down to 14 employees. The exchange only has enough money for about 3 more months of operation. Since the supreme court will not rule until July, it is somewhat unlikely that they will survive the ban if they do not move out of India. Having no exchanges in India will make it nearly impossible for systems like Worldwire and X-rapid to function correctly in the country.
Ripple Signs Federal Bank Ltd of India as Partner
Ripple today signed on Federal Bank of India LTD as a partner as a way to opening up the corridors in India, specifically the India to UAE corridor. India banking system is currently still under the RBI’s ban of not being allowed to work with cryptocurrencies but that may soon be reversed. Even if the ban is not reversed, Federal Bank of India LTD can still use xCurrent for tranferring money, they just won’t be able to use xRapid or XRP.
Coinbase starts a Crypto Gift card in Europe, India allows Crypto for sports betting
There are two pieces of good news today. The first is that Coinbase has made a crypto gift card that you can load with Bitcoin and spend in stores in Europe(kind of like Bitpay) and the second is that India has now allowed Crypto in sports betting.
The Coinbase gift card is a step in the right direction but I don’t see it as a big deal because the merchants are not accepting Bitcoin directly. You have to load Bitcoin as fiat money onto the card first before you can spend it at various merchants although many are accepting the card. The real breakthrough will come when merchants directly accept Bitcoin or Litecoin without having to convert to Fiat first.
India allowing Crypto for sports betting is pretty big since the RBI banned all its member banks from dealing in Crypto. However, that may change soon, especially if they re-classify crypto as a commodity so it doesn’t compete with the RBI itself.
I think these two things combined will be a bump for cryptocurrency holders as now they can more easily spend their crypto and India has gotten a ray of hope for cryptocurrency holders there. Hopefully, this will strengthen the bull rally.
Reserve Bank of India Reversing direction on Crypto Ban?
The Reserve Bank of India may be reversing its cryptocurrency ban as it asks for ways to regulate cryptocurrency in its court hearing today. Why would you ask for ways to regulate something when you’ve already banned it? I think they are seeing how much cryptocurrency is catching on in other countries and that a state-owned crypto like the one that they are going to release is probably not going to work that well or be that popular. They just don’t want anything that can be seen as competition to banks(themselves)for the issuing of currency. That is why they are talking about classifying it as a commodity so it won’t be seen as a competing currency to bank notes. I think in time, they will lift the ban on their member banks and money from India will come in and move the market up. This, combined with other good news makes for a good Q3 and Q4 for crypto.
India July 5th deadline for Banks to un-tether themselves from Crypto approaches
Indian Banks have until July 5th(day after tomorrow) to completely rid themselves of connections and make it so there is pretty much zero liquidity in the country for cryptocurrencies. Liquidity in India was already pretty close to zero anyways so I do not think this will effect it much. However, if you wake up on July 5th and find that the price of Bitcoin has dropped a bit, you should not be surprised as all banks in India would have had to do away with any cryptocurrency connections they had the night before.
I personally think India is taking the complete wrong approach to crypto as it will hinder their people’s interest in blockchain technology and slow their own technological development. Trying to separate Bitcoin or cryptocurrencies from Blockchain is going to end in failure because you are basically killing off one of its primary uses and the one that most people are interested in. In addition, a lot of outside international banks and investors are taking notice of crypto now and adoption is within sight so to try and competely ban it like India or China is a big mistake.
China and India’s Bans on Crypto empowering for Crypto scams
China’s Ban and the Indian bank’s De-facto blacklist of Cryptocurrencies are hurting those two countries in terms of innovation and blockchain. Even more, they are the springboard now for many scams and cons going on in those countries. It turns out that outright banning and blacklisting ICOs in China and India does not make many people quit trading or trying to find ways to quit trading cryptocurrencies, but instead just makes those people look for new and illegal ways to get into the cryptocurreny market. These methods, however, usually must go through shady middle men who often just run off with their client’s money. This has resulted in tens and even hundreds of millions of dollars lost in scams. It seems that the bans are not decreasing the number of scams but increasing them instead. These countries could learn from western countries and loosen up their regulations to encourage Crypto and blockchain but clamp down on Ponzi and Pyramid schemes. It is harder solution than an outright ban(which doesn’t work) but its really the best way forward.
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