Quite a few countries are contemplating how they should treat bitcoin moving forward. Cryptocurrency poses intriguing opportunities, yet it is difficult to regulate as there is no centralized entity controlling the ecosystem. Nigerian banks are contemplating to legalize bitcoin, which would give the popular cryptocurrency a significant boost, to say the least.
Nigeria Has Plans with Bitcoin
It is not the first time someone brings up the concept of Nigerian banks legalizing bitcoin. The same idea was proposed several months ago. Albert no one saw this as a hint of what the future could hold, it would appear various Nigerian banks are thinking along the same lines. This development caught quite a few people by surprise, even though it makes a lot of sense.
An article appeared in The Inquirer, which talks about how the Nigerian Bankers Committee is studying blockchain technology. That is anything but surprising, as nearly every bank around the world is well aware of what distributed ledgers bring to the table. However, there has not been any major product to come forth from this interest so far. Experts predict a few of these blockchain applications will see the light of day in 2017, albeit that remains to be seen for now.
What is more interesting, however, is how the Nigerian Bank Committee still feels bitcoin poses somewhat of a threat the national financial ecosystem. To be more precise, the group touched upon the concept of “dubious virtual currencies flooding the country”. It is not hard to see which projects they are talking about, as OneCoin has become somewhat of a popular concept in Nigeria. Additionally, there is also the MMM Global scheme, which only accepts bitcoin deposits in Nigeria right now.
It is evident the Central bank of Nigeria wants to gain a better understanding of bitcoin and its blockchain technology. That open-minded approach can mean big things for cryptocurrency in the country moving forward. Moreover, it only appears to be a matter of time until Nigeria introduces bitcoin regulation, which could occur as soon as this year. Introducing such a regulation would effectively legalize bitcoin in Nigeria, even though the current is not issued by the country’s central bank.
Nigeria is not the only country in the world looking to regulate and legalize bitcoin. Japan will be doing the same later this year, which will bring a lot more legitimacy to cryptocurrency moving forward. Albeit no one can effectively regulate bitcoin itself, governments can impose specific guidelines for companies dealing with customer funds, either in the national currency or bitcoin. Then again, running a financial business will always be subject to specific regulation and bitcoin enterprises should not be exempt from those rules.
Bitcoin regulation does not have to be a bad thing by any means. China’s central bank issued a few new regulatory measures over the past few weeks, which has only helped the bitcoin price stabilizes as time progressed. It is unclear what Nigeria will do exactly when it comes to blockchain and cryptocurrency, but it will be an intriguing situation to keep an eye on.
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