Due to extremely high volatility shown by the crypto markets, banking institutions across the globe are freezing customer’s debit and credit cards or other means to buy cryptocurrency. A few weeks back, one of Canada’s largest banks – Bank of Montreal (BMO) barred its customers to make crypto purchases through its MasterCard credit and debit cards.
The bank recently has decided to further plug more holes and said that it will no longer allow customers to purchase digital assets through its Interac debit cards. One of the bank’s spokesperson confirmed this news to CoinDesk in an email where he/she stated: “I can confirm that we no longer allow the purchase of cryptocurrencies via Interac Online Payments or by using a retail consumer Mastercard-branded credit or debit card.”
Reports of the same arrived last week when one Reddit user claiming to be the bank’s employee shared a screenshotof a “company-wide” email on March 28. The message in the screenshot reads: “This decision was made due to the volatile nature of cryptocurrencies, and so to better protect the security of our clients and the bank.”
For MasterCard products the ban will be introduced straight away while a temporary charge will be used for crypto purchases through Interac debit cards, shows the email. However, after the latest confirmation, the ban for Interac card transactions will also arrive soon.
Banking institutions across the globe started their crackdown on crypto purchases since the beginning of 2018 sighting issues with higher market volatility. Earlier this year in the U.S, Wall Street giants like J.P Morgan and Bank of America banned crypto purchases being made through their debit cards.
Recently, Denmark’s largest bank – Danske Bank – stated it holds a negative perspective for cryptocurrencies for three major reasons of high volatility, lack of regulatory oversight and lack of consumer protection.
