Bitcoin Forum

My bank, RBC has banned all transactions involving crypto.  I can't even fund my Coinsquare account with my debit card anymore.
This is the response I got when I emailed them about it:

"The cryptocurrency environment is continuously evolving. After carefully reviewing the current regulatory, risk, and external environmental factors around cryptocurrency, we've elected to stop facilitating transactions involving cryptocurrency. We will continue to monitor these factors going forward."

Many countries is fighting against bitcon and cryptos.
In fact, bankers and government will always fight agains, it is like the regular taxi against uber and telecom companies against messagers/voip.

But in the end, they will lose the war. Like uber and messagers that dominates the market almost around the world, crypto will do same. But the bankers/government is stronger and harder to defeat, but in some years it will be done.

Statements such as these are very detrimental to users of cryptocurrency in Canada, should the government be able to be positive about crypto and supervise in a useful way.

the great hope that you put forward can be realized well because indeed progress on crypto will not be avoided, hopefully this era of crypto awakening.

Because the cryptocurrency market could have a big impact on the traditional banking industry.
So Banks may ban bitcoin transactions, but blockchains and bitcoins are a future trend.
The bank is suicidal by themself.

then it is time to change your bank!
it is simple, when a bank that you are using stops offering the service that you wanted to use, then you simply switch to another bank that does offer that service. other banks may not have the same rules, and i know that some of them are even offering cryptocurrency related services such as a cryptocurrency vault in  Pacific & Western Bank of Canada.

Every country has the right to allow, support and participate in the cryptocurrency hype. And so as every country has the right not to for a lot reasons. Recently, Royal Bank of Canada (RBC), the country's second-largest bank by assets, determined that it would allow cryptocurrency transactions only "in limited circumstances," although it did not ban digital currency purchases for its users outright.

This is very bad news and this is very detrimental to users of cryptocurrency, better Canada looking for solutions that can be equally beneficial for both parties.

The 'SO WHAT' mentality will do here, trust me.

If your bank already banned Cryptocurrency transactions then move on to another ways of funding your crypto assets, after all there a lot of ways to do that. We can blame banks to make regulations against cryptocurrencies but we can't stop them because we all know that if it will prosper along the way then it will eventually kill the banking industry also so they're maybe slowing it down to think a way for them to survive in the near future. For me this is a positive thing because banks only showcases the greatness of cryptocurrency that they are not willing to support it.

The Royal Bank did outright ban its clients from buying Crypto.  I was able to use Coinsquare until last week.  Their debit and VISA cards don't work anymore. 

From Canada one of the bank making a ban upon cryptocurrency related transactions is a bad news to the growing industry. Canada is one among the country that has got large number of users than many other countries. Maybe this could be a start of regulating bitcoin usage in Canada as well.

This is really a bad one coming from the bank at this time. But would like to know the position of the central bank of Canada's position on the issue of crypto because if they have not taken a position then the bank is just acting up which gives you the option of opening another bank account in another bank and you can just go ahead and carry out your trasactions otherwise, you have to think of ways of carrying out your transactions under the radar or transacting abroad.

And if the method runs out before that?
Id there is no bank to turn to in order to buy crypto before crypto totally overtakes banks?
What then?

Trade locally via localbitcoins? With that difference to the actual price?
Try the so called decentralized exchanges that are more of a farce than an exchange?

No, the "so what" mentality will only work to deny reality and to think that by ignoring them problems will go away.

That's sad! Even India has started taking such steps. The Reserve Bank of India issues a notice to all banks to wind up their positions from facilitating crypto related businesses. So crypto related businesses are not able operate their bank accounts and eventually thinking of moving abroad to a crypto friendly country. I hope some businesses in Canada takes this matter to court just like some businesses in India did.

However, government knows that they can't actually fight cryptos. That is the reason why they are taking such stringent measures and trying to remove cryptos from the root. But the governments are not realizing that, they are loosing an opportunity of the future. While countries with progressive mindset like Japan and Germany have started benefiting from it, some countries are showing primitive mindset of controlling things. 

Nobody should lose sleep over this news. It is normal because banks are fighting to protect their work and their business. The government and their agents (banks) will continue to try all they can to kill bitcoin and crypto. This war started since lasts quarter of last year till present time but Bitcoin has remain resolute and strong in the face of all these attacks.

For me its still a small news because unlike china who holds the largest hash power overcome their government regarding this matter. I suspect that they ban cryptocurrency because their banks are implementing their own blockchain technology which I think is dangerous because it will hold less transaction rate and susceptible to cyber attacks.

Actually all of these bans are temporary and unimportant, its about regulations, crypto is evolving very fast but regulations are slowly coming into the market so banks have to wait for some clarity.

I guess Canada watched till now and when countries like India are taking strict actions with their banks transacting with Crypto then many will start doing the same. The common Joe needs to understand and start using bitcoin then govts will come after.

Yeah 1000% sure.
Canada is following India, as India is probably the economic model that everybody should follow.
/sarcasm

It's not CANADA!!!

It's one bank in Canada (although the largest indeed), this is not a decision by the central bank, the government, the parliament, the finance minister or anybody else.

.

Again, what actions by the government are you talking about?

Sounds like you need to move to a new bank, however you might be able to use your credit card on other crypto exchanges, you can also try money transfer, it will just take a few more days before your money get there.
Bitcoins ATM's are also a possibility.

In my opinion it shows only that they are confused. Just change a bank and that's it. They don't support crypto transactions because their business model is risk based, and they can't assess the risk involved with crypto and they just want to be on the safe side. I don't think that it means they are anti-crypto, they are just a little scared and confused.

Why would they restrict their clients from buying Crypto with debit though?  It's my money and my risk to take.  They allow me to blow thousands at a casino if I feel like it. 

Bitcoin will be a threat to many of those banks because the success of bitcoin may be lead to loss of value to them, as it will reduce their effectiveness soon even by the time people earn well less people also request loans from and when are better established they invest more in bitcoin. Buy for now they have a lot to offer bitcoin users during exchange.

Wow man, I expected the Canadian banks to be a bit more open-minded about crypto.

Oh well, I guess we can all expect some sort of "push back" from all banks, I mean they know what a massive threat crypto is to their business so they will obviously try to push back wherever they can.

Change is inevitable no matter how hard they try to fight it.

Also, I'm sure if you use LocalBitcoins.com then your bank won't know what the transactions are for. They will not be able to tell that they are crypto related.

I think that while the country crypto-involving laws and regulations are not existent or unclear, their risk departments might not be able to correctly assess the risk involved in their operations and thus they may issue ill-thought internal regulations prohibiting all kinds of such transactions.

On the other hand, gambling laws are usually quite well established and quite mature and that is why that they are very confortable allowing those transactions.

Don't confuse the risk that involves you and their (bank's) risk (like when you gamble, you take your own risks - they couldn't care less about your risk). What I refer to as "risk" is their (bank's) risk - the risk to a financial institution related to legal dealings in uncharted territory of cryptocurrencies.

Canadian banks are open-minded about bitcoin. in fact there are some banks in Canada that are so happy that bitcoin exists and are even talking about adopting it and offering a bunch of services for it. what you read in OP is just one bank in Canada that presumably did this according to OP.

In each flock there must be a black sheep, it seems :)

In my (european) country thay started closing accounts too, some companies running well-known exchanges had to even escape abroad to be able to keep on running their service. Which strikes me as particularly dumb - the authorities could have retained their share of the profit in taxes if they kept them from running, and now the taxes will go to completely another jurisdiction.

Canada didn't have a banking ban for cryptocurrencies right? so I assume that you can still buy and sell cryptocurrencies using other local banks in your country, better to pull out all your money on that bank an transfer to a bank that will let you spend your money on where you want to use it. Some banks are now being threatened by cryptocurrencies that's why they don't want their customers to use their service to purchase cryptocurrencies and those risk and environmental factors are just an excuse. Don't be a puppet of this banks on where you can only use your money. People shouldn't trust banks like this.

Well i don't think you should be surprised. That's why banks are threatened by btc because they control your own money. Think about it, they shouldn't have anything to do with your debit card purchases right? I can understand if it's purchased through credit cards but using debit card should allow to make any purchase you want

I'm from Canada, and i know Royal Bank has stopped transaction related to cryptocurrencies, But it is only 1 bank, There are lots of banks who still fine with crypto, such as CIBC, Scotia Bank, BMO, TD Bank etc, so you don't have to worry about it.

They can see it as a threat so they have to ban all crypto transactions just like what the banks from the India did.

Maybe the same thing will happen that there will be people who will be against to this move who are supporters of crypto. But if this is final and their decision won't change then you have to accept the fact and look for another way to load up your account.

It is just one bank in Canada banning crypto transactions. To make thing easy, why don’t you just open another bank account for crypto? If the other Canadian banks are not banning the crypto transactions, there is no reason for Royal Bank of Canada to continue the ban.

Soon will be entire nations banning crypto, so even if you change to another bank, and let's say you are in Canada like OP... then every bank under Canadian jurisdiction will not allow you to do anything crypto related, which means you are forced to, at that point, move your crypto activities off-shore, which can lead to some problems if you don't know what you are doing.

This is why im too scared to do anything with my coins other than holding them. It's better to just hold long term and let everyone take their masks off and define themselves as pro bitcoin or anti bitcoin, and once it's clear who is going to give you a good treatment and who is going to steal and confiscate all of your funds as soon as they hit their bank's jurisdictions, make some moves. Until then my advice is to not risk it, just hold and let things develop.

Any bank banning you using your actual own money to fund crypto is insane in the developed world.

Get a new sensible bank a global one like barclays or hsbc

These are developing crypto trading platforms.

Sure banning credit card purchases is understandable but all transactions ???


When the winds of change blow some build walls others build windmills...

Smart progressive banks will crush out those that don't see change is here now.... people can always move to other banks so they will expand whilst the others vanish

Cryptocurrency now as a locomotive that can not be stopped. Its development is inevitable. Banks will try to stop it, but it will not stop the development, but only slow it down. This is certainly not good news, well, nothing, bitcoin will survive it.

They are surely going to regret it in some time to come when their customers are going to stop using their banks and go to other banks which are offering services that suit their customers. I suggest that OP moves all his funds to a new bank.

banking restrictions are common in the crypto currency filed but in Germany banks transferring loans through bitcoin so there is variations in every county banks to understand

Well cryptocurrency definitely has risks involved and maybe it would endanger the bank if they continue to get involved in transacting crypto. Because these cryptocurrency is decentralized if something bad happens, bank may not be able to do anything.

Here's the thing.  What if I want to transfer $1,000 to CoinSquare and invest in US dollars or gold stocks?  Who says I'm going to trade my CAD for Bitcoin?  The bank is telling its clients which investing organizations we're allowed to use.  Any email or phone call you make to them just results in a minimum wage employee repeating the same banter about cryptos being risky.

They are simply trying to defend themselves against the inevitable collapse of the banking sector. They can try to ban cryptocurrency trading but there will always be a way, most likely we will move to decentralised exchanges like BISQ.

I'm curious, you are also forbidden to do this: "  transfer $1,000 to CoinSquare and invest in US dollars or gold stocks? "


They are not paid to give their opinion, they are paid to do what they are told to do


this is a problem that can take sleep from OP

It amazes me how this financial institutions and governments thinks they know what the people wants. How can a bank tell me what to do and not to do with my money? So far there is a documented receipt stating i did on my own volition perhaps something bad happen, I don't think it is their problem. But then, what do i know

If you are aware about cryptocurrency then I think you'll not wait for the method to runs out, you will eventually see a signs before it happens.


What do you mean by this? and by the way I think almost all of the exchanges are centralized.


Problems will remain problems if we don't make a solution in solving it, my point here is if you can't control such things then 'so what', move on.

That sucks, Canada is one the leading countries when it comes to crypto regulation and growth. Sad to see this happen, and can only happen their stance gets reversed soon enough. Let it be a half fake ban like all the other "bans"  :D.

wenn they lose the war, the cryptocurrency people will also lose, they will lose their states, their tech basis, their IT supply, their linguistic school system etc.

the problem about cryptocurrencies is the same like the one when the germans decided to genocide the jews,

the interest to create money and live of others that work for it is so huge, that the cryptocurrency people systematically will damage and focus the economy on themselves simily like the jews did, after the kings and european nobility were removed and lost their power to mint money.

this will then create vast poverty for the working population to such an extent that less and less people are willing to work for money at all.

this will then cause a domino effect till the entire economy is basically crushed.

Why now I wonder? And it's not just this bank in Canada, it's most of them. Check Canadian Localbitcoins volume, everyone's gone there instead. Considering the sheer number of banks who've done this in the last few months it must be a relatively coordinated effort.

preventive action is very good, RBC worried if the external factors will give more bad influence on the country. especially from the economic and criminal side.

but this decision is temporary, so, I still see there will be a positive result after they have analyzed cryptocurrency.

the canadian banking cartel is actually from a political point of view highly unnatural, the idea of creating national banking cartels was violently enforced by adolf hitler when he killed all jews in germany and later europe that where active in the financial system.

the war led to the opportunist canadian and american banking cartel to take a strange position opposing hitler and germany while establishing and running thier own banking cartel banning all other cartels in the society respectivly.

now cryptocurrencies are decentralising everything and they try to defent their banking cartel. and their access to "money earning cattle"

You simply switch to another bank that does offer that service. other banks may not have the same rules, and i know that some of them are even offering cryptocurrency related services such.

Too bad, if they have issued a ban, then nothing you can't do. Switch to other banks!