The old saying, “If you can’t beat them, join them” seems to be gaining traction within the traditional banking sector in regards to cryptocurrencies.

On Monday of this week, Bank of America (NYSE:) announced that it will be initiating research coverage of and cryptocurrencies for large investors and analysts – issuing its first research report on programmable money titled Digital Assets Primer: Only the first inning. According to the Bank of America researchers, they took this action because they determined that Bitcoin and cryptos are “too large to ignore.”

“Bitcoin is important,”
Alkesh Shaikh, Global Cryptocurrency Strategy Head, stated this in a company statement.

“but the digital asset ecosystem is so much more. We are exploring the potential implications for all sectors, such as finance, gaming, technology and supply chains. Our view is that there could be more opportunity than skeptics expect.”
According to the Bank of America, cryptocurrencies have an estimated market value of more than $2 trillion and more than 200,000,000+ users worldwide. Researchers also acknowledged the existence of hundreds of companies within the crypto asset class. A class of asset that can transform any industry through reducing friction in transactions and improving operational efficiency.

On Tuesday, US Bank also announced it would be establishing Bitcoin asset custody services. This offering is specifically aimed at large private fund holders and institutional investors who want to safely secure their Bitcoin with a third-party, rather than store it themselves in a “hot” wallet online or via a self-custodial “cold” storage wallet such as Trezor or Ledger wallets.

“Investor interest in cryptocurrency and demand from our fund services clients have grown strongly over the last few years,”
Gunjan Kedia (Vice Chair, U.S. Bank Wealth Management and Investment Services), made the announcement.

“Our fund and institutional custody clients have accelerated their plans to offer cryptocurrency and, in response, we made it a priority to accelerate our ability to offer custody services.”
It’s reported that as of June 30th, US Bank Wealth Management and Investment Services had approximately $8.6 trillion in assets under custody as well as $282 billion in assets under active management.

The combined actions of two of the biggest banks around the globe reinforces the potential and value of cryptocurrency assets. It’s ironic that Bitcoin and its blockchain were originally created as a peer-to-peer payment method intended to supplant the interests and centralized control of “Big Banking and Fat Finance” – which seem to be unwittingly warming up to a potential harbinger of their demise. As with so many things in crypto these days, we’ll have to wait and see how this plays out.

Flipside

• These moves by US Bank of America and Bank of America may seem good for crypto, but they’re only intended to help big investors. Retail investors will not have access to the Bank of America investor research, not US Bank’s Bitcoin custodial services.
• Both these offers are against the crypto ethos that decentralization is possible and wealth can be controlled personally.

What are the reasons to care?

Cryptocurrency adoption can be a dangerous double-edged weapon. It does attract significant investments to the sector, but it also creates pressures towards centralized services and regulatory oversight as well as price manipulation by large investment companies.

EMAIL NEWSLETTER

You can also join the crypto-verse

Upgrade your inbox and get our DailyCoin editors’ picks 1x a week delivered straight to your inbox.

[contact-form-7]
With just one click, you can unsubscribe at any time.

Continue reading on DailyCoin