Kiffmeister’s #Fintech Daily Digest (07/03/2021)*

Ukraine Puts CBDC On Par With Cash in New Payments Law

The Verkhovna Rada, the governing body of Ukraine, reportedly passed a law regulating payment methods that officially puts central bank digital currency (CBDC) on par with cash, bank accounts and electronic payments. The law mentions the “digital money of the National Bank of Ukraine – electronic form of a unit of account in Ukraine, emission of which is run by the National Bank of Ukraine.”

Binance Deploys Crypto Monitoring ‘Traveler’ System to Comply With FATF Travel Rule

Binance has deployed CipherTrace Traveler to enable the exchange’s compliance with global “travel rule” regulations. Traveler is designed to support Virtual Asset Service Providers (VASPs), including cryptocurrency exchanges, custody providers, OTC trading desks, banks and other financial institutions, to achieve compliance with the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network’s (FinCEN) and the Financial Action Task Force’s (FATF) travel rule regulations. 

The 2nd Global Alternative Finance Market Benchmarking Report

The 2nd Global AltFin Market Benchmarking Report shows that total global volume has notably decreased, falling 42% in 2019 and a further 35% in 2020 – from $304.5 billion in 2018 to $176 billion in 2019 and $114 billion in 2020. When Chinese volumes are excluded, the total volume grew 27% from 2018 to 2020 to $113 billion. China dominated the global online alternative finance market up until 2018, but local market developments and regulatory changes have led to a considerable decline in volumes and its global market share. In 2019, the Chinese market accounted for 48% of the global volume, and in 2020 for only 1%. The US and Canada is now the largest regional #AltFin market ($73.93 billion) followed by UK ($12.64 billion) and APAC (ex China) ($8.9 billion). 

Crypto owners are “generally more educated than the average,” according to a new BIS study

Fun fact: A recent Bank for International Settlements (BIS) paper analyzing correlations between crypto investment choices and the level of education and income, suggested that crypto owners are “generally more educated than the average,” especially XRP and ETH hodlers. 

*For those interested in intra-day updates and news that didn’t make the Daily Digest cut, please check out my Diigo fintech bookmarks: https://www.diigo.com/user/kiffmeister/Fintech