Commonwealth Bank which is the largest bank in Australia stated that it would decline or temporarily hold on to certain payments to cryptocurrency exchanges. At the same time, there are vast scales of “investment scams” in the entire crypto ecosystem.
This move of Commonwealth Bank came ahead while two major global exchanges were facing a lawsuit from the United States Securities regulator. Alongside, a few weeks of such events another major Australian Bank Westpac banned its customers from transacting with Binance, the popular crypto exchange.
On June 8, Commonwealth Bank said that it would decline or put a hold on certain payments to cryptocurrency exchanges for 24 hours. This step of Commonwealth Bank is a new measure to protect customers from scams associated with certain payments made to cryptocurrency exchanges. The bank stated that they have added a 10,000 Australian dollar per month limit on customers’ funds transfers to crypto exchanges for purchasing cryptocurrencies. However, this limit will be activated in the coming months.
James Roberts the general manager of CBA’s fraud management services has claimed that scammers are capitalizing globally on the growing interest in the crypto while pretending to be the legitimate investment opportunities for diverting funds into cryptocurrency exchanges. Thus, keeping such a phenomenon in mind bank shared that the talked measure would be subjected to continuous review and help monitor the impact of actions on the entire ecosystem.
However, this approach of the bank is seen as a major turnaround because in November 2021 it was all set to launch crypto trading services for millions of its users through its CommBank App. Recently in May 2022, Comyn was wrangling with regulators to launch the product. Here, the country’s financial regulators won, and the pilot for the crypto trading product was put on ice.
