Volt to Provide Banking Services to Crypto Investors in Australia
- Volt will provide banking services and infrastructure to clients of Australian crypto exchange BTC Markets.
- The partnership is a result of a lack of support traditional banks have shown for customers that engage in crypto trading.
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Neobank Volt, the latest offshoot of Volt’s banking-as-a-service (BaaS) strategy, has partnered with BTC Markets, a cryptocurrency exchange in Australia, to provide banking services to its clients. According to a report from Business Insider Australia, the partnership will see Volt roll out the entire banking infrastructure BTC Markets’ customers need to buy and trade digital assets.
The partnership is a result of increased regulatory pressure in the country, which has seen many banks deny services to clients that engage in cryptocurrency trading. Westpac, one of the largest Australian banks, has been among the most heavily criticized — customers told Business Insider Australia the bank refused to process transfers to trading accounts on cryptocurrency exchanges.
Steve Weston, the co-founder of Volt who served as a banker at NAB and Barclays, believes major banks’ refusal to get involved with cryptocurrencies is a reflection of their risk appetite.
“They’re still remediating past issues and despite some of their people internally telling them they need to understand crypto, it’s just one more issue they don’t want to have to talk to the board or shareholders about,” Weston said. “They just don’t want the hassle.”
Caroline Bowler, the CEO of BTC Markets, said the partnership with Volt shows the amount of effort the exchange is willing to go through to meet Australia’s regulatory requirements. The huge increase of customers in their early 60s has also pushed the company to introduce better compliance, she explained in an interview.
- The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has filed a lawsuit against trading platform eToro over its contract for difference (CFD) product.
- The regulator claimed the product’s target market was too broad, and that eToro used insufficient screening tests when offering the leveraged derivative contracts to retail users.
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- Anonymous sources have said that the offices of Binance Australia were searched on Tuesday as part of an ongoing investigation into the exchange’s derivatives operations.
- Australia’s financial regulator, who conducted the reported search, canceled Binance Australia’s derivatives license back in April, and the exchange no longer offers the service in the country.
- The crypto exchange blamed the issue on a decision made by its third party payments provider in Australia, noting that it is now looking for a new partner in the country.
- Binance Australia assured users that AUD withdrawals are still available, and that they can continue to buy and sell crypto using debit/credit cards and its P2P marketplace.