The top guys at Reserve Bank of India, the Indian central bank have been vocal about bitcoin and digital currencies in the recent months. It can be seen as the growing popularity of bitcoin which has made it too hard to ignore.
The latest comment on bitcoin was made by the deputy governor of Reserve Bank of India, Shri R Gandhi while addressing the attendees of Financial Institution Benchmarking and Calibration -2015 (FIBAC-2015) banking conference which was held on August 24-25 in Mumbai. The comments made by Reserve Bank of India officials shows that there is active discussion happening in the country regarding bitcoin and its regulations.
In his speech, Shri R Gandhi acknowledged that cryptocurrencies and crowdfunding are potentially disruptive concepts that can change the face of fintech. He also mentioned that these technological advances can also lead to undesired consequences if it is unregulated or kept unchecked.
As the topic of the conference was about technological disruption and financial inclusion, the topic of bitcoin and crowdfunding was befitting to be included into the discussion. Shri R Gandhi acknowledged the fact that cryptocurrency can be the solution for solving concerns regarding transaction settlements. In one of the publications, he was quoted saying
“Digital currencies and crowdfunding have the potential to support criminal, anti-social activities like money laundering, terrorist funding and tax evasion. While we do not have any reported instances of crowdfunding in this respect, cryptocurrencies have been widely suspected to finance criminal activities. We have to be carefully and critically watching these developments.”
In other instances S.S. Mundra, the deputy governor of Reserve Bank of India had spoken about the need for global coordination to address the issues related to bitcoin price volatility and its use for criminal activities.
Governor of Reserve Bank of India, Raghuram Ranjan has also spoken about bitcoin in one of his speeches. He had mentioned the need for a comprehensive investigation of bitcoin and digital currencies before central bank takes any action regarding digital currency regulations.
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