Commonwealth Bank becomes Australia’s first bank to offer buying and selling of cryptocurrency

As a first, Commonwealth Bank Australia (CBA) is offering its customers an opportunity to buy and sell cryptocurrency such as Bitcoin. To let customers trade in digital currencies on their CommBank app, CBA has tied up with Gemini, one of the world’s largest regulated cryptocurrency exchanges. The pilot for this new concept will be run in the upcoming weeks, while it will be available to more customers in 2022 if trialled successfully. Currently, the Commbank app has more than 6.5 million active users making it the largest banking app in the country. Once implemented, users can deal in up to ten selected cryptocurrency assets like Bitcoin, Ethereum, Bitcoin Cash and Litecoin.

In a statement, CBA CEO Matt Comyn said that many customers sought an easy way to deal in crypto. As a major bank, it naturally led them to adopt cryptocurrency. He says the entry of digital currencies and demand emerging from customers has paved the way to new opportunities and difficulties for the financial services sector. They believe that they can play a crucial role and cater to customer demand by providing security, stability and competence through a crypto trading platform. Along with their partnership with Gemini, they have also associated themselves with Chainalysis, a blockchain analysis firm helping them to conceptualise a secure platform.

Further, he added that there is a shortage of trusted crypto services in the market, and customers have often complained about the hesitancy to use third-party exchanges because of the threat of fraud. And this is where CBA comes in to offer a dependable and safe experience for their customers. CBA has pledged to redefine banking as well as add more features on the CommBank app, which includes investing and shopping.

Details related to fees for trading in cryptocurrency, which is an important aspect that influences investors, hasn’t been released by the bank yet.