The “second wave” of crypto will be regulated and more environmentally friendly, according to Starling Bank CEO Anne Boden.
Speaking on the UKTN Podcast, Boden explained that the crypto industry is currently “lacking sufficient practical and moral purpose”.
The lack of safeguards in the cryptoasset industry has led to numerous scandals and controversies, including the collapse of crypto exchange FTX last year.
However, there is hope for crypto to become safer and shake off its negative image, Boden said, but that is currently “a dream”.
“One day, crypto will be safe and highly regulated on an international basis with protection for consumers and businesses,” the fintech chief executive said.
“But from where we stand at the moment, that’s a dream. One day I can see the potential, but it’s not where we are today.”
Boden said that regulators need to treat crypto exchanges with the “same standard as other financial institutions” and any that are unregulated must not be allowed to trade.
“I think we will have several years of regulators trying to regulate more, I think we’ll see some more failures,” Boden said. “I then think we’ll see a second wave of crypto exchanges and schemes of some sort that will be far more friendly to the planet and will be highly regulated.”
The government has been working towards a more robust regulatory regime for the cryptoasset industry, a move that the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has been calling for.
At the beginning of February, the Treasury announced its proposal for crypto regulation, which aims to provide consumers with similar financial protections to other investments.
In November 2022, Starling said it would no longer support crypto transactions on its banking app. The decision was part of its review on preventing financial crime.
A spokesperson for Starling at the time told UKTN: “We recently tightened restrictions on inbound and outbound transactions by card and bank transfer. Today’s message was to make sure that customers who have made such transactions in the past, but not recently, are aware of this.”
You can listen to the full UKTN Podcast interview with the Starling founder here.
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