Key facts:
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The BCRA reports that the ban is to “mitigate risks”, but does not give further details.
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Ualá is one of the virtual wallets that offered to buy and sell bitcoin.
Virtual wallets in Argentina, such as MercadoPago or Ualá, are prohibited from offering the sale of bitcoin (BTC) and cryptocurrencies to their users. This was established today, May 4, 2023, by the Central Bank (BCRA).
«Payment service providers that offer payment accounts (PSPCP) may not carry out or facilitate operations with digital assets, including crypto assets, that are not regulated by the competent national authority and authorized by the Central Bank of the Argentine Republic (BCRA)”, says the announcement of the bank.
The same document clarifies that “by offering or facilitating is understood the availability of automated purchase buttons for the user. Interested persons must carry out the operation on their own.
The purpose of the ban, as stated, is to “mitigate the risks” that “users of financial services and the national payment system” could have. The BCRA does not indicate what these risks are.
Among the virtual wallets that offer the sale of crypto assets is Ualá. As CriptoNoticias reported in November last year, the mobile phone application incorporated bitcoin and ether (ETH) trading.
From now on, these “payment service providers offering payment accounts” are on an equal footing with commercial banks, which had already been hit by a similar ban since May 2022.
