Philippines Considers Bitcoin Regulation amid Remittance Increase
The Philippines government is discussing whether to regulate digital currencies like bitcoin in the country to improve protection for its citizens as the number of Filipinos abroad using bitcoin to send money back home increases. Ranked as the world’s third largest recipient of remittances, with nearly $30 billion coming into the country last year, amounting to around 10 percent of the country’s GDP, the Philippines is ripe to take advantage of the digital currency. The Philippine central bank could soon regulate digital currencies like bitcoin. In a report from Bloomberg, Nestor....
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The practically non-existent start-up ecosystem in Philippines has suddenly sprung to life. Thanks to the bitcoin revolution, the number of start-ups, particularly cryptocurrency related ones is increasing from the past couple of years. The success of Bitcoin in Philippines can be attributed to the social and economic factors. The two main factors that has led to a bitcoin boom in Philippines: Philippines has a huge remittance market. Like China and India, there are many Filipino emigrant workers employed across the world. Like in any other developing countries, even the emigrant Filipinos....
The Philippines may soon introduce Bitcoin regulations amid increasing usage of cryptocurrencies for remittance. Bitcoin is increasingly being used for remittance in developing countries. Bitcoin remittance is probably the highest in the Philippines. In the current scenario, the country’s government has decided to draft Bitcoin regulations. The decision was made public by Nestor Espenilla, deputy governor of the country’s central bank, Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas. The implementation of cryptocurrency regulations will be helpful to Filipinos as it will offer them protection amidst....
FastCompany’s report revealed that overseas remittance totaled $429 billion in 2016. Some of the largest Remittance markets include China and the Philippines. Already, bitcoin startups have begun to dominate the remittance markets in the two countries, with the Philippines leading bitcoin remittance innovation. Both domestic and international remittance is a massive market within the Philippines. Companies such as Lhuillier and Palawan operate thousands of branches throughout the country, with deeper market penetration in comparison to international remittance companies such as Western....
The Philippines has the world's third largest remittance market just behind India and China, with overseas remittances reaching more than $25.1 billion in 2013. But due to the country's poor banking systems and expensive remittance services, overseas Filipino workers and the local workers working far from their provinces have always searched for alternative systems for transferring cash. For generations, remittance services including Lhuiller and Palawan Pawnshop dominated the market in the Philippines, despite its high transaction fees. On average, the fees are close to 10 percent for....
The Philippines is a home to some of the industry’s most innovative startups including Coins.ph and Rebit.ph, that enable cost-efficient remittances from their home country to international recipients. At Bootstrap Manila, Bitcoin startups & investors revealed that 20 percent of remittances from the Philippines to South Korea are processed using Bitcoin. Coins.ph recently secured a $ 5 mln investment from former Google CEO Eric Schmidt’s fund, due to their unique approach that instead of competing with banks and existing financial services, it would be more beneficial for its users to....