Gone are the days when crypto was considered a niche market trend that only selected few companies followed. Lately more and more traditional companies are accepting crypto and making it conventional in the financial industry. Big companies are introducing certain rules and regulations to make payment via cryptocurrency more conventional and commonplace among their customers.
Here is a list of some of the traditional companies that have taken a step towards embracing crypto. Let us take a deeper look into the kind of initiatives these companies are taking in order to integrate crypto within its payment structure.
- Santander
Santander is a major Spanish bank that has recently started offering crypto related services to their customers. They announced that they recognize the growing need for crypto-related services from their customers and it lies in their best interest to meet the needs of their customers.
CEO of Santander Brazil, Mario Leao said, “We recognize that it is a market that is here to stay, and it is not necessarily a reaction to competitors positioning themselves, it is simply a view that our client has demanded this type of assets, so we have to find the most correct and more educational way of doing so.”
Santander Groups have stated this year July that they would start their initiative with cryptocurrency in the coming months.
- Blackrock
Blackrock is a major asset manager firm that has recently engaged in a partnership with Coinbase. This partnership is supposed to allow Blackrock’s clients to manage their crypto based assets on Coinbase with the help of their suite of software tools, Aladdin. With the help of their set of tools clients can conduct risk analysis on their investments and manage their assets in a more efficient way.
Global Head of Strategic Ecosystem Partnerships at BlackRock, Joseph Chalom has commented in the wake of their recent partnership, “Our institutional clients are increasingly interested in gaining exposure to digital asset markets.”
Blackrock’s current partnership is exclusively focused on Bitcoins. However, they have expressed interest in including the entire range of digital assets within their company policy.
- JpMorgan
This October, investment banking giant JpMorgan has extended access to four funds from Grayscale Investments and one from Osprey Funds. This initiative seems to have changed the institution’s firm critical stances regarding crypto that was expressed by the company’s CEO, Jamie Dimon earlier harsh comments on crypto.
This initiative undertaken by the company, paired with the CEO calling crypto “real, new technology” is indicative of the changing attitude of the industry towards cryptocurrency.
- Chipotle
Fast food chains like Chipotle are also dipping their toes into digital currency. They recently came out with a policy which was aimed at attracting crypto users. Chipotle’s ‘new interacting game ‘Buy The Dip’ allows the participants to win USD 200,000 worth of free crypto. It also provides their customers with promod codes of USD 0,01 guacamole and Queso Blanco for a few weeks. This move was seen as a deliberate attempt made by traditional companies to attract crypto users to their hood.
- Schwab Asset Management
Schwab Asset Management released their Schwab Crypto Thematic exchange-traded fund (ETF) earlier this month. They cited their move towards including crypto based assets within their management as a direct response to customer response.