German bank with big plans offers crypto trading to customers

Although the crypto world is still officially in a bear market, there seems to be a movement within the banking world to introduce Bitcoin, Ethereum and many others to customers directly. European digital bank N26 announced earlier this week that it is starting a crypto investment account. The originally German bank, which is active in 22 countries, will first test the project in Austria before expanding it in the European Union.

Although classic banks are still not a fan of crypto, it is clear that in the German speaking part of Europe (Germany, Switzerland and Austria) there is growing interest.

Bear market

The service, which will be called N26 Crypto, will be made available to the bank’s Austrian customers in the coming weeks and will initially contain 100 digital coins, including Bitcoin and Ether. In the first six months of 2023, the service will then be expanded to customers in other countries and the number of coins on offer will be expanded to 194.

Gilles BianRosa, N26’s chief product officer, said that:

Customer interest in crypto remains very high, even in this bear market, and that this product allows customers to dip their toes in the crypto market without sizeable risk.

N26 is one of the largest European fintech companies in recent years and is valued by the market at $9 billion.

Such a service is already offered on other continents. In America you can trade crypto via PayPal and Visa and Mastercard have recently started offering the service. Earlier this week, Nubank, a Brazilian digital bank, also started the service.

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