Major Aussie bank takes next step to AUD stablecoin after Chainlink test transaction

September 15, 2023 Coin Telegraph

A$DC

One of ANZ’s banking executives, Nigel Dobson said the bank sees “real value” in tokenizing real-world assets on-chain like the Aussie dollar.

Australia and New Zealand Banking Group is one step closer to launching its bank-issued stablecoin A$DC after the bank successfully executed a test transaction on Chainlink’s Cross-Chain Interoperability Protocol (CCIP):

ANZ’s banking services portfolio lead Nigel Dobson said the transaction was a “milestone” moment for the bank in a Sept. 14 statement:

“ANZ recently worked with Chainlink CCIP to complete a test transaction to simulate the purchase of a tokenised asset, facilitated using A$DC and an ANZ-issued NZ-dollar-denominated stablecoin.”

Dobson said the firm has been experimenting with several networks — presumably to test out where the ANZ’s Australian dollar stablecoin can be best utilized:

“We’re actively exploring the use of decentralised networks through a ‘test-and-learn’ approach,” the ANZ executive said.

As Australia and New Zealand Banking Group (ANZ), one the world’s largest global banks with over $1 trillion in total assets under management, demonstrates the use of CCIP for secure cross-chain stablecoin transactions, the role of Chainlink and CCIP as a standard for interbank… pic.twitter.com/qdehsUX4rQ
— Sergey Nazarov (@SergeyNazarov) September 14, 2023

Dobson said ANZ sees “real value” in tokenizing real-world assets like the Australian dollar and that it can transform the banking industry if the right technologies can come together:

“Tokenised assets are already changing the way banking works and the technology has the potential to do more - if the right pieces can come together.”

ANZ minted the first A$DC stablecoin in March, 2022, which was the first of its kind in Australia.

However, the other three Big 4 Australian banks — Commonwealth Bank of Australia, Westpac and National Australia Bank — recently imposed restrictions and in some instances, full blocks on bank transfers to several “high-risk” cryptocurrency exchanges.

Bendigo Bank followed suit in late July.

These banks cited the need to protect customers against cryptocurrency scams as the main reason behind imposing the restrictions.

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Australian ‘Big Four’ bank ANZ halts cash withdrawals from many branches

March 31, 2023 Coin Telegraph

ANZ

The move comes as Australians continue to reduce their usage of cash and bank branches, but has sparked fears that the death of cash is near.

ANZ, one of Australia’s “Big Four” banks, will cease facilitating withdrawals and deposits from a number of its Australian branches as it looks to push its customers toward using an ever-dwindling number of ATMs and deposit machines.

The decision has received pushback, with critics such as Patricia Sparrow, CEO of the Council on the Ageing, telling The Australian that the change could disproportionately affect older people who are less capable of going digital. Others have suggested it would make fiat users more susceptible to technical issues. The move has also renewed fears of a push to eliminate cash and that cash could soon be replaced by central bank digital currencies (CBDCs).

The end of cash is near.

They are trying to go all digital, and then bring in the Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) to be programable so they can control how you spend your money.

Eventually they will be able to make your CBDC money expire or disallow certain products. pic.twitter.com/8O27nn4iYe
— Wall Street Silver (@WallStreetSilv) March 29, 2023

In response to questions from Cointelegraph, an ANZ spokesperson said that the affected branches are all metropolitan branches that have ATMs and deposit machines nearby and that the move was partially prompted by in-branch transactions decreasing by more than 50% over the past four years.

The development comes as Australia gradually transitions to a cashless society, with the percentage of retail payments made with cash falling from 59% in 2007, to just 27% in 2019, according to a March 16 bulletin from the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA).

The RBA noted that the results from its 2022 survey will be available later this year, but added that the COVID-19 pandemic had only accelerated the trend, with businesses also contributing to the shift:

“Furthermore, a substantial share of merchants indicated plans to discourage cash payments at some point in the future.”

The RBA also pointed to a reduction in ATMs and bank branches around the nation, with the number of bank branches falling by 30% since 2017 while ATMs numbers fell by 25% since 2016.

One of the major concerns with CBDCs replacing cash is how they might affect individual freedom and privacy, as cash transactions offer anonymity and the ability to make transactions without leaving a record.

A CBDC pilot program is currently underway in Australia, with an update expected around the middle of 2023, and one of the ramifications identified by the RBA was that it could displace the cash Australian dollar.

In an emailed response to questions from Cointelegraph, a spokesperson for another of the Big Four banks, NAB, allayed these fears somewhat, saying:

“NAB still handles cash at our branches and we have no plans to change. Cash will continue to play an important part in Australian society for as long as our customers want it to.”

The other two banks in the Big Four, CBA and Westpac, did not respond to questions from Cointelegraph by the time of publication, but Westpac told The Australian that it also had no plans to wind back access to cash through its branches. A CBA spokesperson was slightly more ambiguous in their response, however.

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Contagion only hit firms with ‘poor balance sheet management’ — Kraken Aus boss

August 3, 2022 Coin Telegraph

ANZ

The crypto contagion only hurt entities that poorly managed their treasuries, but didn't affect the underlying blockchain technology, he said.

The crypto contagion sparked by Terra’s infamous implosion this year only spread to companies and protocols with “poor balance sheet management” and not the underlying blockchain technology, says Kraken Australia’s managing director Jonathon Miller.

Speaking with Cointelegraph, the Australian crypto exchange head argued that sectors such as Ethereum-based decentralized finance (DeFi) revealed its fundamental strength this year by weathering severe market conditions:

“Some of the contagion that we saw across some of the lending models in the space, [was in] this traditional finance kind of lending model sitting on top of crypto. But what we didn't see is a kind of catastrophic failure of the underlying protocols. And I think that's been recognized by a lot of people.”

“Platforms like Ethereum did not fail when the volatility hit. You saw decentralized markets, decentralized lending models, DeFi in general, not fall over. There was no contagion there. What you saw was poor balance sheet management from closed shop trade fee lenders,” he added.

Miller's comment comes despite CoinGecko reporting a 74.6% market cap decline in DeFi during Q2 2022 following the collapse of Terra and a rise in DeFi exploits. Though the crypto data aggregator also noted that the industry managed to retain most of its daily active users.

Miller also added that blockchain projects only ran into issues when the design of their underlying protocols was “obviously poor”, such as the case of Terra’s algorithmic stablecoin TerraClassic USD (USTC).

“I think that's a trade off. There's a Treasury management problem, not a blockchain problem,” he said.

Questioned about how Kraken fared through the crypto bear market this year, Miller suggested the company was well primed to deal with the volatility. He noted that the company has survived many downturns in its 11-year history, and notably didn’t blow a lot of money on marketing during the bull run last year.

“We're in a slightly different position as perhaps some of the other exchanges that have been out there spending lots of money on advertising. We've got a really strong word-of-mouth business model,” he explained.

Miller was also optimistic about the current state of the Australian crypto sector, stating that there are a lot of “bullish underlying signals from businesses who are still building products.”

He pointed to major banks such as ANZ recently testing the use of its own stablecoin on Ethereum, and major payments giants such as Mastercard joining the Blockchain Australia Association, signaling strong “intent to become involved in crypto and blockchain.”

“So you know, institutions making use of the underlying tech, maybe some heat out of some of the speculative characteristics, that we saw through 2022, which is potentially even a good thing.”

ANZ’s stablecoin used to buy tokenized carbon credits

June 27, 2022 Coin Telegraph

A$DC

The latest A$DC transaction saw ANZ’s institutional partner Victor Smorgon use A$DC to purchase Australian Carbon Credit Units from blockchain-based carbon trading platform BetaCarbon.

ANZ’s stablecoin A$DC has been used to buy Australian tokenized carbon credits, marking another critical test of the asset’s use cases in the local economy.

In March, the “Big Four” bank became the first major Australian financial institution to mint its own stablecoin after overseeing a pilot transaction worth 30 million AUD ($20.76 million) between Victor Smorgon Group and digital asset manager Zerocap.

ANZ’s stablecoin is fully collateralized by Australian dollars (AUD) held in the bank's managed reserved account. So far, A$DC transactions have primarily been conducted over the Ethereum blockchain.

According to a June 27 report from the Australian Financial Review (AFR), the latest transaction saw its long-time institutional partner Victor Smorgon use A$DC to purchase Australian Carbon Credit Units (ACCUs).

The carbon credits were tokenized and provided by BetaCarbon, a blockchain-based carbon trading platform that issues digital security assets dubbed “BCAUs,” which represent one kilogram of carbon offsets per credit.

The transaction also saw participation from Zerocap again, who provided market-making services and liquidity by exchanging the A$DC sent from Victor Smorgon into USD Coin (USDC) so that BetaCarbon could accept the deal. The value of the transaction has not been specified, however.

In terms of the bank’s outlook on the crypto/blockchain sector, ANZ’s banking services portfolio lead Nigel Dobson told the AFR that the firm is looking at blockchain tech as a means of “pursuing the transition of financial market infrastructure” and is not necessarily interested in speculative crypto assets themselves.

“We see this is evolving from being internet-protocol based to one of ‘tokenized’ protocols. We think the underlying infrastructure – efficient, secure, public blockchains – will facilitate transactions, both ones we understand today and new ones that will be more efficient.”

Dobson echoed similar sentiments at the Chainalysis Links event in Sydney on June 21, noting that ANZ promptly “banned the word crypto immediately in all of our internal communications and narrative” when it started exploring blockchain tech a few years ago.

He went on to add that the bank has explored multiple use cases for blockchain tech, such as supply chain tracking and providing on-ramps via stablecoins for institutions to invest in digital assets. However, Dobson suggested that tokenized carbon credits were a key area that the bank has been gearing up for:

"Another area where we have a strong position in terms of sustainability is where we feel the tokenization of carbon credits and marketplaces driven by tokenized assets and tokenized value exchange will be really efficient."

At the start of this month, ANZ ruled out offering any crypto exposure to retail investors due to their lack of financial literacy.

Maile Carnegie, an executive for retail banking, noted at the Australian Financial Review Banking Summit that “the vast majority of them don’t understand really basic financial well-being concepts.”

Aussie banks ANZ and NAB won’t ‘endorse’ retail speculation on crypto

June 1, 2022 Coin Telegraph

ANZ

Executives from two of Australia’s “big four” banks have said they won’t allow their retail customers to trade crypto with ANZ, adding they’re happy they didn’t “go head long” into a cryptocurrency offering.

Executives at two of Australia’s “big four” banks have ruled out allowing retail customers to trade cryptocurrency on their platforms, with one reasoning that customers don’t understand “basic financial well-being.”

Speaking at the Australian Financial Review Banking Summit on Tuesday Maile Carnegie, executive for retail banking at Australia and New Zealand Banking Group (ANZ), said that from speaking to retail customers, she believed “the vast majority of them don’t understand really basic financial well-being concepts.”

“Are we really going to make it easier and less friction and implicitly endorse speculating on crypto when they don’t understand basic financial well-being? The answer was no.”

Carnegie said ANZ had considered a cryptocurrency product from as early as 2017, adding she was “happy we didn’t go head long” into the offering.

Also attending the summit was Angela Mentis, chief digital officer of National Australia Bank (NAB), who was asked if NAB would consider offering crypto trading. She answered “not in the foreseeable future and not for retail” but added there are already applications for blockchain technology for institutional clients.

In March, ANZ became the first bank in Australia to mint an Australia dollar (AUD) pegged stablecoin called A$DC, and NAB is also gearing up to launch its own stablecoin, which is expected to be operational by the end of 2022.

Both stablecoin projects from the big banks will initially be offered to institutional clients seeking an on-ramp for crypto investments. The pilot transaction of A$DC, for example, was a 30-million-AUD transfer.

The only big four bank with plans to launch a retail crypto trading product is the Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA). At the summit, its CEO, Matt Comyn, said despite facing challenges, it was still its “intent” to launch the service.

The CBA revealed plans to enable crypto trading in November 2021 by partnering with the Gemini crypto exchange, with limited trials beginning shortly after. But in April, news emerged that the Australian Securities and Investment Commission had tied up the launch with regulatory red tape, citing concerns about consumer protections, which prompted the CBA to start planning a second pilot of the product.

In late May, the CBA put its plans for the second pilot on hold indefinitely and cut off crypto trading to those in the first round of testing, with Comyn saying at the time the bank was still waiting on regulatory clarity.

At the summit, Comyn added that if it were to proceed with the offering, the bank would look to restrict trading to those “who understand the risky asset class.”

Hitting back at the comments from the banking executives, Ian Love, founder and CEO of crypto investment firm Blockchain Assets, tweeted:

“How will we ever reduce wealth inequality when our regulatory system has financial discrimination at its core? It’s time to remove the ‘Sophisticated Investor’ discrimination rules that advisors use to hide behind and allow everyone access to financial advice and services.”

ANZ bank executive: The ‘weight of money’ means crypto can’t be ignored

November 5, 2021 Coin Telegraph

ANZ

“When you look under the hood on that, we've concluded that this is a major protocol shift for financial market infrastructure,” said Nigel Dobson, ANZ’s Banking Services Portfolio Lead.

One of the ANZ bank’s senior executives has told a Blockchain Australia forum that the crypto sector has grown too big to be ignored by traditional finance.

The comments came a day after rival Commonwealth Bank announced that it would roll out crypto trading services for 10 digital assets via its Commbank app.

The “State of Play” forum was held by Blockchain Australia on Nov. 4 and featured representatives from organizations including Mastercard, ANZ and NAB offering their take on the crypto sector in the wake of CBA’s play.

Today we hosted the 'State of Play' with over 1200 registrations and speakers from some of Australia's most recognisable businesses.

The conversation signalled very clearly that a revolution in payments is on our doorstep. pic.twitter.com/S32Vc4KToO
— Blockchain Australia (@BlockchainAUS) November 4, 2021

Nigel Dobson, ANZ’s Banking Services Portfolio Lead stated that the growth of the crypto and blockchain tech over the past 12 to 18 months has put the sector firmly on the bank’s radar:

“There's this sort of weight of money that you just simply at some point can't ignore right? And you know, in the DeFi world that we've been watching for a while or even in just the currency space, it's just the weight of money and the quality of money that's moving into these venues that it makes us think, well, what is happening here?”

“When you look under the hood on that, we've concluded that this is a major protocol shift for financial market infrastructure,” he added.

Dobson is a senior banker with more than 30 years of experience at Barclays, Citibank and ANZ. He likened the technological advancements brought about by blockchain tech to the transformative effects the Internet had on global commerce in the early 2000s.

“We're seeing the same kind of shift occurring here. We're shifting to more decentralized, arguably more trusted, more secure, faster, cheaper, better — yet to be proven —but if that's the thesis that these protocols can generate better outcomes and new business models, then they can't be ignored,” he said.

None of the other members of Australia’s big four banks has announced any immediate plans to follow CBA in enabling crypto trading. Dobson stated that it was unclear how CBA’s trial would go, but implied that the ANZ is likely to join the party at some stage.

“I think the move that the CBA made yesterday was bold and it is yet to be seen whether those customers will embrace that. But certainly all of what we've been talking about today, particularly in this section of the commentary, is that that the ship has sailed. And so what it is that we need to do is to navigate our path towards utilizing these networks,” he said.

The bullish comments mark a significant change from the bank, which recently settled a case with Canberra-based Bitcoin trader Aaron Flynn after he took legal action against ANZ over de-banking between 2018 and 2019 due to his work as a Digital Currency Exchange (DCE).

Commonwealth Bank to enable crypto trading for 6.5M Aussies, ‘other banks will follow’

November 3, 2021 Coin Telegraph

ANZ

The CBA stated that it will support 10 crypto assets in its banking app, including Bitcoin, Ethereum, Bitcoin Cash and Litecoin.

The Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) is set to launch crypto trading services for the 6.5 million users of its CommBank app.

The CBA will become the first bank in Australia to support crypto, and Blockchain Australia says it is “inevitable” that the other ‘big four’ banks including National Australia Bank (NAB), Australia and New Zealand Banking Group (ANZ) and Westpac will soon follow suit.

According to a Nov. 3 announcement, the CBA has partnered with the Gemini crypto exchange and blockchain analysis firm Chainalysis to launch its crypto services. The bank will launch a pilot for a limited number of customers in the coming weeks, before rolling out the full service in 2022.

Ten crypto assets will be supported in its banking app, with Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Bitcoin Cash (BCH) and Litecoin (LTC) named at this stage.

Steve Vallas, CEO of Blockchain Australia told Cointelegraph that this move was “extraordinarily important” as the big four banks in Australia “underpin our national and international reputation as a financial services destination.”

“The confidence that this provides local digital asset sector participants will be dwarfed by the impact that this signal sends around the world that Australia should be a destination for cryptocurrency and digital asset adoption.”

Vallas believes the rapid growth and adoption of crypto has “shifted the risk of maintaining a wait and see approach” in the view of the big banks to a risk of “inaction” and being left behind. Vallas believes it is only a matter of time before the other major Australian banks launch their own crypto services.

“It is inevitable that the other banks will follow suit. Clarity in the local regulatory landscape is emerging with issues such as licensing being tackled head on by industry and by Governments. That impediments to action and participation are being removed,” he said.

Caroline Bowler, the CEO of local crypto exchange BTC Markets echoed similar sentiments to Vallas, noting that “with regulation in the offing and the largest bank in the country allowing it, the floodgates are now open for more appetite from traditional finance.”

“CBA's move is exciting and inevitable. It's yet another 'red-letter day' for crypto and it is as though Australia has suddenly put the lead foot down. We have been touted as playing catch up all this while, but now we're moving into a leadership position globally with our largest bank.”

Dave Abner, the Global Head of Business Development at Gemini said that his firm was “proud” to be working with CBA to launch world leading crypto services.

“The exponential growth of digital assets internationally, coupled with Gemini’s institutional-grade security and proactive regulatory approach, positions this partnership to set a new standard for banks and financial platforms in Australia and across the globe,” he said.

Not everyone was pleased with CBA’s partnership however, with Adrian Przelozny the CEO of Australian crypto exchange Independent Reserve expressing his dismay over the bank partnering with an overseas firm.

“It’s disappointing that CBA went with an overseas player and didn’t engage with local players at all. We will be reaching out to the other Australian banks now,” Przelozny said.

Cointelegraph reported on Oct. 15 that Allan Flynn, a Canberra-based Bitcoin trade settled his first complaint at the ACT Civil and Administrative Tribunal against ANZ for de-banking him in 2018 and 2019 due to his occupation as a Digital Currency Exchange (DCE).

While ANZ denied any liability, the bank offered him a chance to reapply for a bank account, suggesting that the bank is more open to crypto than it was two to three years ago. Flynn also has a similar case against Westpac ongoing.

Commenting on today’s news, Flynn told Cointelegraph that the crypto landscape in Australia is rapidly changing:

“There a lot of things suddenly happening in the Australian Bitcoin space; you have the Senate inquiry, ANZ’s acknowledgment of a legit human rights question to be answered in my complaint, AUSTRAC’s extraordinary statement on de-banking last Friday and now CBA’s digital currency plans being unveiled.”

“I’m just here arguing my lawful human rights and hoping it makes a difference,” he added.

ANZ

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