Crypto tiptoes into the Aussie mainstream: CBA first Australian bank to offer cryptocurrency trading

3 November 2021

In an Australian first, the Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) has announced that it will allow its 6.5 million existing customers to buy, sell and hold 10 cryptocurrencies directly through its CommBank app, including Bitcoin, Ethereum and Litecoin.

CBA’s crypto offering, to be piloted in the coming weeks and launched sometime early in 2022, will be facilitated by partnerships with two established players in the crypto space.  

One partner is Gemini, a New York-based crypto exchange and custodian founded and operated by Tyler and Cameron Winkelvoss, the twins whose infamous dispute with Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg was portrayed in 2012’s The Social Network.  

The other is Chainanalysis, which provides blockchain data, software and research services to exchanges, financial institutions and government bodies.  

CBA hopes that the two experienced, international partners will add necessary layers of perceived and actual safety in terms of risk and compliance.  

CBA CEO Matt Comyn said:

Customers have expressed concern regarding some of the crypto services in market today, including the friction of using third party exchanges, the risk of fraud, and the lack of trust in some new providers. This is why we see this as an opportunity to bring a trusted and secure experience for our customers.

CBA’s entrance into the retail crypto trading space comes just two weeks after a Senate inquiry released its final report into Australia as a Technology and Financial Centre, which we foreshadowed in our earlier article on the subject.  The report, among other things, recommended much-needed regulation of the sector, including licensing digital currency exchanges, custodial and depository services.

It also comes hot on the heels of ASICs guidance for crypto-asset related exchange-traded products (ETPs), such as exchange-traded funds (ETFs) whose underlying investments are crypto assets.  The non-binding guidance covers admission and monitoring standards, custody arrangements, pricing mechanisms, disclosure and risk management.

It appears that CBA won’t yet allow its customers to use cryptocurrencies in the app to buy goods or services.  However, Mr Comyn did say that CBA “…remain committed to reimagining banking and will continue to bring more functionality into the CommBank app including investing and shopping”.