India poised for massive crypto growth: Cashaa Founder
By Priyanka Pani
The Indian cryptocurrency market is poised for growth and the market share of crypto transactions is expected to grow exponentially by 2022 both in India and globally. The worldwide cryptocurrency and blockchain technology market is estimated to witness a CAGR of 35.2% during the forecast period 2016–2022.
During the Covid-19 lockdown, India alone has witnessed a 400% growth in crypto trading. Banning crypto-currency is not a solution and India may opt for a more suboptimal solution for its market by taking time out to understand and develop a constructive regulatory framework around it. This will allow the government to gauge its potential, develop tools, and derive policies to stop fraud in the industry, something Cashaa has been using over the past years to make sure its users do not deal with bad actors in this space.
India has been progressing in the right direction when it comes to technology. Topics such as the dark web and fraud reports have marred the image of the crypto industry. They have been the focal points during demand calls for a Crypto ban.
What do you think is a strong case for allowing cryptocurrencies in India, that the government must take into consideration before any decision?
The Indian market has the potential to become one of the largest markets for crypto worldwide. Most of the major companies are actively focusing their effort to bring cryptocurrency to the masses across the Indian landscape. The narrative is simple; it will aid the eradication of poverty, provide a boost to the economy, and help create jobs, especially during the post-COVID-19 Indian economy.
What are your experiences across the world, when you see the industry with respect to policies, technology, and perceptions in this sector? How is the world dealing with it?
In 2014, New York state was the first to regulate crypto, a decision that was soon followed by all major countries and strong financial regulators such as FCA and MAS to name a few. In terms of technology, there has been a sizable growth in decentralized technologies. However, as a Banking group providing services to hundreds of crypto companies, the majority of the use cases still revolve around financing.
It is also important to note that most of the countries around the world have not banned cryptocurrency and have instead opted for a neutral or positive stance on it. With regulatory frameworks in place, these countries have benefited from businesses moving to where they are treated best.
What separates Cashaa from its rivals? What has been your USP?
We are a banking platform where is a part of our systems like Sterling Pound, Dollar, and Euro. We believe crypto is an evolution of money, and as a next-generation neo bank, we are committed to treating it like that. In a normal circumstance, most businesses have the option of choosing between a traditional bank and alternative neo banks. But both of them are not capable of handling crypto-related transactions and compliance.
Our focus right from inception has been on compliance and developing technical infrastructure which is required by the emerging business. Having built a large network and a good reputation over the years in the crypto industry, we got a huge response following our 2019 launch. Since then, we have been continuously adding more banking products and services.
Due to our huge amount of transactional data on cryptocurrencies and national currencies, we can enable governments to understand things better and develop a positive outlook towards the industry. It will enable regulators to stop fraud or system compromise by following our compliance policies.
Could you shed some light on the emerging technology and the emerging ecosystem such as DeFi?
The year 2020 saw the rise of decentralized finance. This has led to a popular perception that a whole new side of the industry is being created. It is expected to disrupt the way currently lending, borrowing, and fund management is carried out.
DeFi is a better alternative to traditional banks is interest rates, most notably in the Eurozone with its negative interest rates, which gave way to the initial rise of DeFi companies’ popularity.
However many DeFI protocols are not addressing the issues of compliance and insurance by empowering the masses without breaking the AML laws and trying to minimize the risk of unknowns. Hence, Cashaa is the go-to banker of the crypto and will be soon introducing its own decentralized version.
What is Defi and how will it change the financial scape? What will happen to the centralized format of banks in such an eventuality?
DeFi systems are evolving rapidly and it will enable complete transparency in terms of operations regardless of who creates or maintains it. Users will be in control of their money, unlike in the case of traditional banks who have custody of your account. Users will be free to operate across geographies without worrying about restrictions by relying on documents to manage funds. This will of course open up the banking facility to those underserved (1.7 billion people estimates). In the end an absolute control over their money for a User.
The banking and finance industry has been working more as a cartel than a business for centuries, but now they have competition from the technology. The centralized institutions will adopt a transparent method or will be made obsolete in the same way print media, telecoms was done by the Internet.
What are Cashaa’s India plans?
In 2021 we are expanding to the USA and India. We already started issuing USD accounts regulated by the Banking division of Colorado, to our existing business clients as BETA users. Crypto brands who already started to use our USD accounts are Nexo, CoinDCX, Uncoin etc.
In India we are already the largest liquidity provider and offshore bankers of most of the major crypto exchanges and will soon launch the neobank to start crypto-friendly banking in India regulated under Reserve Bank of India.
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