BNY Mellon, The Oldest Bank In America Starts Supporting Bitcoin

BNY Mellon, the oldest bank in America will now be supporting Bitcoin by storing BTC on behalf of its clients according to a new report that we have in our latest Bitcoin news.

BNY Mellon, the oldest bank in America added support for Bitcoin on behalf of its crypto clients according to reports by the Wall Street Journal. The bank will transfer and store Bitcoin as well as other digital currencies. Roman Regelman who is the chief executive of BNY Mellon’s asset servicing and digital business said:

 “Digital assets are becoming part of the mainstream.”

According to reports, the bank wants to enable cryptocurrencies to flow through the same systems that are used for traditional currencies and stocks. It also created a prototype for doing this while trying to engage with clients to see if they want to use it. Regelman said that the bank will treat cryptocurrencies in the same way as traditional assets which only shows that they exist outside of the system and crypto can work along with the traditional financial system.

Announcing the creation of the BNY Mellon Digital Assets unit – A team dedicated to building the first multi-asset custody and administration platform for traditional and digital assets, including #cryptocurrencies. https://t.co/aZ7wMfAXqg pic.twitter.com/L54TFVpJNv

— BNY Mellon (@BNYMellon) February 11, 2021

Bitcoin went through a transition phase to the mainstream and with a lack of Bitcoin ETF, the Grayscale trusts have been filling the void and provide a new way for investors to get to crypto via a regulated way of getting exposure thanks to its Trusts. Companies started putting BTC on their balance sheets as well like Microstrategy that has a balance of about $3 billion in BTC. Tesla also announced that it invested $1.5 billion in BTC which both make it clear that the number one cryptocurrency is too important for banks to ignore.

As recently reported, Visa seeks mass adoption with its new crypto pilot scheme that is designed to help banks facilitate BTC and crypto services. First Boulevard, a digital bank that has a mission to help “Black America build wealth” is the first bank that will take part in this program. Jack Forestell, the Chief Product Officer at Visa says that the company is looking to close the gap between crypto and its merchant network however this API Scheme intends to take this to a new level by bringing banks into the game.

Visa CEO Alfred Kelly spoke about crypto in 2018 and called it a speculative commodity that is not backed by anything. He also refused to deal with it. This year, however, Kelly seems to be having a change of heart.