With last year’s crytocurrency crash in the rearview mirror, Credicorp, Peru’s biggest financial services conglomerate, has ruled out launching crypto-based financial products in the near term.
The Lima-based company, which a presence in Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Mexico and the U.S., says it continues to explore use cases. However, the impact of the crypto winter, price volatility, and risk aversion stemming from the collapse of the FTX exchange, appears to be weighing on the banking sector’s plans for bitcoin and ether.
“It’s still an area of exploration for us,” Francesca Raffo, Credicorp’s corporate innovation manager, said at a press conference on Tuesday in response to a question from iupana. “We don’t necessarily plan to launch products screaming out loud,” she said.
Last year, Credicorp’s banking unit, BCP, hired Lenin Tarrillo as crypto product owner and charged him with scouting for opportunities in the crypto industry and turning them into legal, secure projects.
According to Raffo, the bank has divided its exploration of crypto into two areas: the first is opportunities offered by blockchain technology in the signing of smart contracts, and second is cryptocurrencies themselves.
For some investors , digital currencies have emerged as a refuge from inflation and turmoil in the banking system following the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank, Silvergate Bank and Signature Bank, something that we explained in greater detail last week.
Despite an increase of 70% in the value of bitcoin in the first three months of this year, its remains almost 40% below the level of March 2022, when it was worth about US$175,000.
“We’ve seen really important value issues in the last 12 months. Some cryptocurrencies have lost a lot of value, some mismanaged, others not so much,” Raffo said.