New Delhi, Nov 24 (FN Bureau) Most crypto currencies continued to trade in red on Wednesday, as the government set the ball rolling to ban the private digital currencies. The government’s move to table the Bill seeking to ban crypto currencies except certain cases had caused massive slide in the prices on virtual currencies on domestic exchanges. One of the most popular crypto Bitcoin was trading 11 per cent lower at Rs 40,93,019 on local exchange WazirX at around 7:40 pm. Ethereum was down by 10.78 per cent at Rs 3,07,000, while Dogecoin traded 16.49 per cent lower at Rs 15.64 on Wednesday. Despite being very volatile and one of the most risky investment assets, crypto currency has found huge favour among the youth and investment in the new age asset class has been on the rise. India is among the countries, where crypto has seen instant adoption driving the overall growth. While there is no official data on crypto currencies in the country, industry estimate has pegged the investment in cryptos at Rs six lakh crore with number of investors going into few crores.
According to broker discovery and comparison platform BrokerChooser, the total number of crypto owners in India now stand at 10.07 crore, which puts it ahead of every other country in the world. US stands at second position with number of crypto owners at 2.7 crore, followed by Russia (1.7 crore) and Nigeria (1.3 crore). “In comparison, the number of stock investors registered with the BSE/NSE in India has risen to 7.4 crore at present while for MF (Mutual Fund), it stands at 11.4 crore. In terms of share of crypto investors as a percentage of population, India stands at fifth position at 7.3 per cent vs Ukraine (12.7 per cent), Russia (11.9 per cent), Kenya (8.5 per cent) and US (8.3 per cent),” said Hemang Jani, Head – Equity Strategy, Broking & Distribution, Motilal Oswal Financial Services. Quoting crypto research and intelligence business CREBACO, Jani said that Indian crypto investments have increased to over USD 10 billion from USD 0.9 billion in April’20, as crypto markets touched an all-time high. There have, however, been a lot of concerns around crypto in India as well as globally. It has been feared that the virtual currency could pose huge risks to the global financial system. Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Shaktikanta Das has red-flagged crypto currencies, maintaining that they are serious threat to the financial system since they are unregulated by Central banks.
Amid growing concerns around crypto currencies, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had on November 13 held a high-level meeting and comprehensively discussed various aspects around the emerging investment asset. The concerns around unregulated crypto currencies becoming avenues for money laundering and terror financing were also discussed. “It is important that all democratic nations work together on crypto-currency and ensure that it does not end up in wrong hands, which can spoil our youth,” PM Modi said last week, while delivering the keynote address at the Sydney Dialogue. A Bill seeking to prohibit all private crypto currencies would be taken up in the forthcoming Parliament session that commences on November 29. The Bill on crypto seeks to create a facilitative framework for creation of an official digital currency to be issued by the Reserve Bank of India. “The Bill also seeks to prohibit all private crypto currencies in India, however, it allows for certain exceptions to promote the underlying technology of crypto currency and its uses,” a Lok Sabha bulletin said.