Standard Chartered CEO: cryptocurrencies are ‘here to stay’, but likely to be overshadowed by other digital assets
- There is a role for non-fiat currencies, particularly as concerns rise about inflation, Standard Chartered CEO Bill Winters said
- Standard Chartered unveiled a cryptocurrency custodian joint venture in December
However, they are likely to be surpassed in terms of growth and importance by other types of digital assets in the future, such as stablecoins, central bank digital currencies or, even, non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
“I think there’s a role for non-fiat currencies, especially when parts of the market are concerned about inflation,” Winters said on a conference call following the bank’s Innovation and Digitisation Event on Wednesday. “Broadly we’ve gone through long period of low inflation and we’ve got central banks experimenting in uncharted territory with very, very loose monetary policy. It’s perfectly reasonable for people to want an alternative to fiat currency?”
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Dimon has been a long-time critic of cryptocurrencies, such as bitcoin, but said his clients are “adults” and the bank would give them “legitimate, as clean as possible, access.”
The price of bitcoin topped US$55,000 on Wednesday evening.