Bitcoin Forum

What is your opinion, do you think that banks are slowly starting to adopt Bitcoin?


Source:
https://cointelegraph.com/news/union-bank-of-the-philippines-launches-bitcoin-and-ethereum-trading

Give us a link so that we can know the country that you are talking about and to also know if this is true or not.

This is not the first bank that will allow their customers to buy and sell bitcoin, there are many banks like that since two or three years ago or more that allow bitcoin trading. I got a friend in UK that told me he bought bitcoin directly on his bank account since early last year. If the central bank and the government in the country that you are accept bitcoin, this will not be a problem.

Atleast provide the source for this news since this is not global but rather only for Philippines. You can use this https://cointelegraph.com/news/union-bank-of-the-philippines-launches-bitcoin-and-ethereum-trading as source so that your reader will have an idea about what you are talking about.

Unionbank is known as the pioneer bank that embrace crypto. They also offers different courses that related to blockchain. This news is long waited by Filipipino consumer that involves to Bitcoin since we can by directly using our UB account.

It's important to mention that only selected retail can use this feature since this is just on a pilot program. It's still a great news and thanks for sharing.

Where you got this information? Union Bank doing there business on Bangladesh and bitcoin is still illegal on Bangladesh so it is not possible yet to accept bitcoin trade on Union Bank. i am not sure they can accept bitcoin trading Because i didn’t get any news about it. before posting a new information you should post a source link where you got the information.

Ops this source mention that the Union Bank start crypto trading on Philippines not another countrys Branch

Gradually most of the countries will turned massively to adopt bitcoin since few of them are already taking this moves and it shows a strong force towards achieving global adoption of bitcoin. But my thinking is if this is being carried out smoothly bank could actually have full control of people fund since the BTC is being deposited in their app and the app is controlled by their tech department meaning the government will still have all individual records and transaction. Likely all payments and transaction could be track and traced by bank or government this now gives a low credits to decentralized nature of bitcoin and it's holders, still it's better to buy with the app and then moved it to a noneconstudial wallet to automatically decapacitate the government from monitoring your transactions or trades within the user or holders of philippines.

A welcome development and if you ask me, it's a good thing banks are coming round to accepting that fiat can not be really relied on for innovation so the best thing is to include crypto services.
The Bank of Philippines started paying close interest towards digital currencies in 2018 when they disclosed their plans of offering the country's first Blockchain payment system for business called B2B Connect.
 On a daily basis people are discovering the limitless possibilities Bitcoin can offer and I'm glad that the Philippines are not bottlenecks will let such opportunities pass them.
 BTC rocks!!

I don't think that banks are starting to adopt bitcoins. What I know is that banks are looking for means to increase their earnings, means to continue keeping their customers, and ways to make sure that they fit in with the trends. Those are just what they are after; they are after what can come in their pocket and not what can benefit their customers.
 
What we should ask is: What are they bringing to the table that's not already theirs? The answer is nothing; they just want to make it seem as if they are giving their customers the best of service, making their crypto purchase easier, but what they are truly doing is taking their own little percentage from every purchase and withdrawal you make, making sure they track the address where you will send the crypto from your bank to, as that will be essential for them to use and track your privacy bridge. They can also tax you, as they can use any means possible to trace your crypto profit, so if you are asking me, I will tell you that banks are expanding their budget for milking their depositors.

Banks are finding all means to always be in custody of people's funds. Banks like to be in charge of holding peoples money and using in for business. They have seen that bitcoin wants to deprive them of this, and it will make them  run out of business in the nearest future. This is why they have started coming up with motives of accepting crypto trading so that you can buy your bitcoin from them and they will claim that banks is the safest place to store your coins. This will give them the power to be in custody of many customers crypto assets. Trying to turn bitcoin as if it is safe in a centralized system. Also they are business people and they are after profit making and not putting customers interest first. It is good to see banks accepting crypto trading but so many people that will buy bitcoin through banks might end up not being in self custody of their funds.

Does this news mean that cryptocurrency is now legal in the Philippines? I am sure that all banks in any country are governed and regulated by a central bank. In the Philippines Central Bank of the Philippines does that job. If a bank is now offering crypto service then it does look like they have got permission from the Central Bank.

This is a piece of good news for the crypto community. It makes life easier for those who are into crypto trading and also those who want to hold Bitcoin and other crypto for long-term gain. 

I checked your link and saw that the union bank along with the partnership with Swiss Technology started adopting bitcoin and Ethereum. But they mention that this service is limited to the philippine. If we think about what should force the banks to support Bitcoin then I found that both the bank and Bitcoin are the opposite of each other, bitcoin is decentralized while banks are central with one authority. the only reason for Bitcoin is for their own interest. They know the world is going to adopt Bitcoin and it will be beneficial so they started this through they also take most of the benefits from it.

But I am confused maybe it is valid or not if banks hold bitcoin, will it affect the decentralized nature of bitcoin or not banks are centralized and when they hold bitcoin they have some control over it this is my thought and I don't know is ture or not. 

This is good news for Bitcoin. It is now obvious that a lot of institutions are working out ways of embracing Bitcoin as has been shown by PayPal and now Union Bank. In the shortest time, many will join because like it is always said, "if you can't beat them, join them"

Even though this is just in the Philippines,  I'm confident it will expand to other countries. This will surely drive more innovations that will lead to Bitcoin integration into many businesses.

This is from our country. I haven't gone through most of the details but for everyone's sake just to have an idea. Unionbank is a local bank here and they've been supportive of crypto. But there have been reports that when a customer deposits money that came from the source through crypto, they've put a red flag on it. A few crypto users and as well as depositors of that bank have posted it on social media before. While it is good to have another wallet and exchange here in our country. I can say that these wallet providers and exchanges here are becoming competitive because we're having a lot of options and that's in favor for us.

My impression changes according to the type of service. If it keeps Bitcoin in a safe place for investors and gives them certificates or access in their banking services without the possibility of withdrawing to their wallets, then this type of adoption is bad because it exposes investors to risks. However, it is not possible to guarantee that these banks actually bought Bitcoin.
If it is possible to withdraw currencies to wallets, I think it is a good adoption and better than centralized exchanges that do not guarantee anything to customers, with a high possibility that you will be scammed.

Different bank branches in different countries adhere to the standards of those countries, you may find that they accept the service in one place and reject it in another place according to those standards. This does not prevent the Philippine branch from providing the cryptocurrency service and that it does not exist in Bangladesh.

As far as I know, some banks in the Philippines are exploring the adoption of Bitcoin and Ethereum, but they have not yet implemented them in their services, as far as I understand. Except for other wallet apps such as Gcash, Maya, and Coinsph, when you use them, you can buy Bitcoin, Ethereum, and other cryptocurrencies.

And the only thing I know that is really open to Bitcoin and Ethereum is Unionbank. So if we talk about whether Bitcoin is actually accepted by the banks here in the Philippines, there is nothing clear about that because it is still being studied by other banks that are already planning adoptions here. But there are Crypto-Friendly’ Banks and Financial Institutions in the Philippines (https://bitpinas.com/learn-how-to-guides/crypto-friendly-banks-philippines)

Good! Some banks have slowly started to understand their path of survival and getting into crypto market for good. I am sure, a lot of other banks will join the bandwagon in coming months and years.

Banking business directly contradicts with the cryptocurrency structure. Also banks are seeing the interest around this area so they are stepping up to get into this market as a future survival strategy. Net positive!

It's October btw (FTFY).
I'd honestly not go for such options because it'll expose us to the government as all this is being done just to snatch away our freedom of preserving our financial responsibility on our own. Banks will surely give our data to income tax and governments and if you come from a country where huge taxes have been levied on your profits, then I am sure you will not go for this.

One of my friends got that exact problem with Unionbank too, deposited 20k USD worth in PHP then got flagged by the bank although to be fair with the bank, my friend quickly withdrawn the same amount so definitely it's understandable that it's flagged as suspicious, that was one of the reasons why that friend stopped using Unionbank, plus there are other online banking much better than Unionbank now so it's not that big deal that UB plans to accept bitcoin trading or crypto.

Yes I think Banks are slowly softening their views towards Bitcoin, I'm not sure if "Adopt"
is a relevant description - yet.

Also I think when more institutional investments become the norm there will be more
acceptance from the banks. For example if and when Blackrocks  ETF gets approved
it will be a game changer, not only for investors but also for the perception of Bitcoin
by other individuals and other institutions.  

The thinking might be "if Blackrock can get a Bitcoin spot ETF it has to be something
to get into"

Yes, crypto is legal here as long the services that offers it applies for license which is not that hard to get since regulators here doesn’t much care about crypto. Government here doesn’t care about crypto, not against nor pro so it’s pretty much you can apply for license easily. Law makers has their own personal agenda with their businesses instead of tackling thoroughly all important aspect of our country such as technology development such as Bitcoin.

This is indeed a great news since UB is one of the popular bank here due to it's convenient terms which you can open a bank account easily using your smartphone without any personal appearance in the bank. I'm surprised that this topic was posted here first in global.

I think we need to wait for a while first , I mean lets see the effect first and if people in crypto will take this as advantage or another threat because this will surely involving KYC in which many of us tries to deny passing if given a chance.
anyway I love this to come if ever and I am surely one to use this when that happened .

Let the Banks adopts Bitcoin if they like, but that shouldn't be your own concern and this must not confuse you into thinking that it's safe to use your bank account to directly purchase Bitcoin, because the only way your government can crack down on crypto investors is finding traces of bank transactions that includes Bitcoin or crypto trades.

If Banks are adopting Bitcoin it's for their own good, they are simply investors like you, but do not break your privacy because of this, I have my reasons why I don't use PayPal to purchase crypto or use any centralized payment solution to purchase crypto, they can betray you.

Bitcoin is a decentralized digital asset, the government has realized that Bitcoin can't be beaten so the only option they have left is to join the train, there is a saying that 'if you can't beat them, you just have to join them.

Still, my advice stands, do not trust any centralized bank with your crypto assets, they might start coming up with yield ideas like DeFi projects and those new LSDs projects, and be the keeper of your Bitcoin yourselves.

That is for sure but crypto in our country is no longer a secret and if it's about taxation, it is a certain thing. The reality about it is that, unlike any other countries where IRS is too strict about collection of tax. Our Bureau of Internal Revenue isn't. But you're right about the potential of the Unionbank giving that data to the government if there's a need to chase those users that have been missing to file their taxes. Well, it's really different here in our country and only the big ones are always getting the attention of the government. If you're too small whether you're a trader or an investor, you just have to do it on your own and file it voluntarily.

That is not limited for government to look only for those traders who don't file taxes, they may also scrutinize every single person if they want to take out taxes on every single transaction that comes from crypto. I know about some countries where crypto taxes are weird and they treat it as gambling. This will only harm the innocent people who will use banks happily to buy crypto because the culprits who are involved in things like smuggling, kidnapping, child trafficking will never go through banks to cashout their crypto that they collect in ransom.

Cryptocurrencies have been legal in the Philippines and the country has one of the highest populations of crypto users. Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) Circular No. 944 in 2017 made cryptocurrencies a valid payment method. You are correct that no commercial bank can offer any service without registration and getting the needed authorization from the Central Bank. I never knew there were Union Bank in other countries because we have such a bank in my country. However, they don't offer crypto services because the Central Bank forbids them from engaging in crypto transactions.

Although these crypto services offered by banks promote centralization, it has a way of promoting crypto awareness. Some people will never invest in the industry except institutions like banks are involved. It also attracts more investors to the industry. Hopefully, as Bitcoin awareness keeps growing people will begin to see the importance of controlling their crypto investment, thereby ditching centralized platforms.

It looks like cryptocurrency isn't officially accepted as a legal tender but they are classified as virtual currencies which falls under digital assets. The Central Bank issues licenses to platforms like UnionBank and they are called Virtual Asset Service Providers where citizens can trade their digital assets so the treatment of crypto is more like stocks.

Even if that source does not mention KYC, but I feel that KYC is a must thing that users will comply and need to do KYC when they want to use the apps. We do not know what the reaction from the user is but they will not have a problem with that, although the other users can choose the other apps.

Those who care about their identity will not want to use it and will stick to what they used until now. And using that apps will be an option for their people because their people already have their favorite apps.

Yes, we need to wait for a while and see the result. If people like it, it will help the adoption. But if not, I hope the apps still have an update from the developer so the apps can run for a long time.

This is a great initiative  and if the story be true, then it is actually a welcome development and if I'm not wrong, we also have unionbank over here in my country  and we refer to it as the union Bank of Nigeria and I believe  and I wanted to know if the development is for their branches globally or is it for a particular  region?
Please bear with me if my questions aren't right as I didn't take the time and pleasure of reading the original story from the link you provided.

Another thing is that, hope the bank isn't trying to seek a way to tax digital assets because personally I'm really sure everyone gets into business for profit and the bank isn't exempted from that.

Remember that all the governments used to ban bitcoin and cryptocurrency, and now they are slowly accepting it, which means they have found benefits in it. There is no reason why banks have been so vehemently opposed to cryptocurrencies, and now they are providing us with convenient avenues to invest in cryptocurrencies. Always be careful with what the government or banks give us, there are no free meals in this world, everything has its price. Taxes are the reason why all governments want to accept bitcoin and cryptocurrencies.

Banks surely will adapt and implement a money-making opportunity scheme/method that arises from cryptocurrency, especially if the local governments fully support or have a friendly policy toward this sector. Bitcoin is surely an example. The barrier of why others did not follow suit is that the government disallows such adoption.

However, we must note that any Bitcoin that the user buys through the application will surely be within the custody of the bank itself or the entity that the bank partnered with. I believe it still would open up the opportunity for a greater and wider bitcoin adoption. An existing bank user will be exposed to bitcoin easily, therefore, they may want to dig deeper into what bitcoin is really all about. Or simply to the one who hasn't heard bitcoin before.

If I remember correctly there's already a thread about this topic which also mentioned UnionBank, for those people who's not aware from it, it's really from Philippines so we could say that's a local bank. Of course we could say that there's a lot of local banks here that mostly used and much prefer by people. So what's the UnionBank much better than the others for a crypto user or Bitcoiner? They are open to accept any kind of transactions that involved crypto or bitcoin because actually the other banks would not accept it as they cannot allow it due to it's decentralized so it would be hard for them to trace money that are entering their system. And now they announced some new features in mobile for sure when other banks find how good the impact of crypto or Bitcoin to them, they would literally copy what UnionBank did.

No.

One bank can't change it all. Union Bank has been a crypto-friendly bank ever since, and they've been supporting it for quite some time already. Well, I don't want to judge the outcome of this update coming from them, but I wonder if there will be some Union Bank users who will try this feature of them. Do banks slowly starting to adopt Bitcoin? Nope. Like I said, it's only 1 bank, and did we heard a news regarding those big banks out there that they'll be adding features that's related to crypto in their current system? No.

I'm from PH, and also has a Union Bank account but TBH, I will not try to touch on this one. I'd rather trade on Binance than here.

Maybe I'm wrong, I think the app would sync with the user's Unionbank account or use it for default fiat deposit storage. If you're an existing user, KYC will no longer be requested. Or if you're completely new, Unionbank will handle user registration.
This method is the same as my local forex platform.

Do you mean the bank as a whole?

In my view, so far we are still not completely convinced that unless the country opens up its policies globally regarding the status of Bitcoin, then banks will be able to do the same. However, if you operate where Bitcoin is not used as a legal medium of exchange, the bank will face a very risky challenge. Transaction involvement in banks is about controlling financial entry and exit, so to see banks implementing the Bitcoin payment system means we need to look at central government policies first and not immediately establish policies outside the bank's authority.

Let's just see what will happen because in our country there are countless trading platforms we can use but UB is the biggest name among all if in case but I don't think that it would be the bank as a whole probably it is just a feature on their app or website to have this. Let's just see what will happen next month if this is ever rolled out.

If this is a success then this would be the first bank to have this kind of feature on their app but I am not sure if we can also transact Bitcoin in their actual bank.

That's good news as the adoption rate will increase but this step might not be liked by the enthusiasts of decentralization (E.D.). I mean to say, that banks are centralized and they offer BTC trading, which is totally the opposite of decentralization. That's why I said E.D. might not like this step. But there will be 2 types of people in the world. Like if there is bad then there is good.

This means, overall the adoption of BTC will increase and that's good for the BTC price. And you asking why BTC is being adopted by the banks? I say they don't want to be left behind just like the post office has lost traffic due to email and mobile phone networks. They don't want people to move on to crypto/BTC. That's why they are adopting BTC but those who will use their products have to follow their rules. And one more thing we all should keep in mind is that, "If you don't own the key, then you don't own the assets".

If governments have made plan to catch those who are involved in crypto then they can easily trace them. They don't have to adopt BTC just to bring people to use it. Although, you have a good point here because history has proved that whenever a exchange or a platform bankrupted and seized comes under government's ownership. They are centralized and have some loop holes in them.
You are right, because they can easily imply tax on the BTC user. Because many people use BTC in countries where they have to pay tax, they are finding ways to reduce the tax and eliminate it totally. And some are successful too. That's why banks are making things easier for them because they don't have to spend a lot of time tracing the person making the transaction so that they could be taxed.

There's nothing new in this, if the government surely allows for the use of bitcoin in making transactions and payments then the banks will also have no choice than to embrace the same adoption along the line with them, if we consider how the people are accepting bitcoin and making payments in this same digital currency, banks wouldn't want to be left out in this kind of financial opportunities because they are always open to offers that can bring in money for them continuously.

Are they going to provide only BTC trading or in other pairs too? That's a good step towards adopting the trends of the world, but I doubt if any person would like to buy BTC directly from such banking apps. I mean, there remains no purpose to buying BTC, and how can a buyer or holder of BTC take advantage of the exclusive benefits of BTC if they are buying it from such centralized banking apps?

And even stroking them on such apps. This does not look good, but overall, it makes BTC look good. Because those who have not taken any positions in buying BTC will try to buy it now. Many people still love banks, but they also want to give BTC a try. And they don't want to do it using any decentralized platform.

That's why banking apps will open those doors for such people, and the adoption rate of BTC will increase, which will increase the value of BTC because there will be more demand and the supply is going to shorten due to the halving event.

These banks not just Unionbank have that triggered about a sudden huge deposit and then if the customer has also done the same thing successfully before. It's a common alert for them and that's why I don't do huge deposits because that's how they're going to be triggered.
Especially if the activity on the account isn't that much and then all of a sudden, there's a larger amount that comes in out of nowhere. That will truly question the customer about how he'd got such funds. And it's all about the money laundering suspicious and that's why even if you're truthful to them that it's your profit in crypto, they may just allow you to withdraw but that would be the last time for you to use them.

heard of stories in the past of certain crypto users getting flagged on their banking app after declaring that their funds came from crypto earnings (even if it's from trading so make it make sense lol), so this narrative of unionbank being "crypto-friendly" is something that doesn't sit right with me. Got a couple of friends who lost a reliable banking provider all cause they won't accept crypto funds, so why be crypto-friendly now when you can just double-down on the hate against crypto, they did it anyway with the banning of crypto-borne funds and profits in their platform anyway.

And while to some this may come as good news, I'm not particularly stoked about it either, we have more reliable trading applications and exchanges on the market now, there's probably nothing different that's going on with their trading platform, could be even worse cause of fees.

Well, I am speaking for what's actually happening in our country in terms of taxes. Yes, they're not only going to deal with traders and investors but to almost everyone who's living in here. But I am foreseeing on how other countries that are strict with tax compliance, our country might be next on it.

Not all but few countries. Many are neutral and have nothing to say until they make laws and adjusts some policies about it including what they can benefit adopting it. While it's true that there's always the reason why they have to do this but somehow, if they're seeing no problem on it. It's either they support or not worry at all.

It will be available only for select retail customers. Well, I hope this will become successful, since one of my major bank I'm using is Union bank, so it's gonna be easier soon to buy and sell bitcoin or eth without leaving the actual facility that hold my fiat.
One of the main thing I'm hoping here is a reasonable transaction fees. By doing it everything directly from the bank, we were able to save some fees already because we have eliminated the use of an exchange or trading platform, Union bank should maximize this opportunity.

Yes true, we are still a while to go before anything like that to happen. I do agree that it is going to be a tough one but we are going to get there eventually which will be fine, I do believe that we need to reach to a point where life will be easier to handle and should be considering it a bit better.

I agree that it is not simple to get the banks to be a lot more public and open about bitcoin, they are not all entirely sure about the process and if it will be profitable for them and what are the negatives and what are the positives, so we just have to give them some time to make their calculations. If the result gets to a level where they should do it for their own good, they will do it anyway.

I believe this news because in my country union bank was the only bank that offered Bitcoin direct buying and selling before the central bank hard to attacked Bitcoin by placing a direct bank involvement in cryptocurrency transactions, that is what placed the limitation on union bank attempt to keep developing on that services.
So since this is coming from the Philippines and now that the government of that country is taking steps to regulate Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency make it easier for the bank to go ahead with this kind of service, but we have to be aware of the privacy risk of using a centralized platform such as banks to buy and store our bitcoins.