Major Portuguese bank blocks fiat transfers to crypto platforms

Banco of Investimentos Globais (BiG), one of Portugal’s largest banks, started blocking fiat transfers to crypto platforms, according to a notification shared by Delphi Labs co-founder José Maria Macedo.

The notification cited compliance with guidelines published by the European Central Bank (ECB), the European Banking Authority (EBA), and the Bank of Portugal about risks associated with offering digital assets.

Additionally, the notification states that the decision was driven by a need to ensure compliance with the country’s laws against money laundering and terrorism financing.

BiG reported nearly €7 billion in assets under management in 2023, equivalent to roughly $7.2 billion.

Notably, for now, blocking fiat transfers to crypto platforms in Portugal seems to be coming just from BiG. According to a user commenting on Macedo’s publication, fiat transfers to crypto platforms using Portugal’s largest bank, Caixa Geral de Depósitos, are regular.

Macedo criticized BiG’s move, stating:

“Crypto is inevitable, banks are dead, and these abuses of power will only redpill more ppl into moving their wealth on-chain.”

EU’s mixed stance on crypto, blockchain

The guidelines mentioned by BiG could be related to a publication by ECB economist Jürgen Schaaf, a known Bitcoin (BTC) critic. In February last year, he published a paper highlighting Bitcoin’s volatility and potential environmental damage. 

The document also questioned Bitcoin’s price at the time, when it crossed the $50,000 price mark, claiming it was a “dead cat bouncing” fueled by market manipulation. The flagship crypto has since climbed another 100% in value.

At the time, Schaaf argued that the approval of spot exchange-traded funds (ETF) in the US would fail to make Bitcoin attractive as a secure and legitimate asset. He concluded the document by urging tighter regulation of BTC, up to “practically forbidding it.”

On Oct. 20 of the same year, Schaaf published another paper claiming that Bitcoin benefits early adopters to the detriment of new investors. He also claimed that Bitcoin does not increase the economy’s productive capacity. 

Meanwhile, Piero Cipollone, an ECB Executive Board member, recently called on the EU to embrace digital assets and distributed ledger technology (DLT) to tackle the fragmentation of Europe’s capital markets.

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