Financial industry will accept crypto if regulators allow it

Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan said on Tuesday that the US banking industry will accept cryptocurrencies for payments if regulators allow it.

The head of the second-largest bank in the US by assets was asked by CNBC's Andrew Ross Sorkin about how the industry's approach to crypto could change given President Donald Trump's commitment to digital currency. .

“If the regulations come in and you actually do something that you can do business with, you'll find that the banking system will come in hard on the commercial side,” Moynihan said in an interview at Forum World Economist in Davos, Switzerland.

American banks have largely avoided allowing customers to use crypto for retail transactions, although their institutional trading and wealth management arms have participated in markets for bitcoin ETFs. Industry leaders, incl JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, has lambasted bitcoin as a currency for criminals and fraudsters.

“If you go down the street here and you go in to buy lunch, right, if you can pay with it” visa, Mastercarddebit card, Apple Payment, etc., this would just be another payment method,” Moynihan explained. “We already have hundreds of patents on blockchain, we know how to enter the field.”

The former CEO of Bank of America didn't address the idea of ​​cryptocurrencies like bitcoin as an investment or a store of value, saying it's “a very separate question. “