City AM has today revealed results from a poll which indicates that half of Brits would not support the Bank of England (BoE) in launching its own cryptocurrency linked to the Pound Sterling.
https://twitter.com/dcyfor/status/986236972682297344
The survey, conducted by research firm D-CYFOR, suggested that UK government punitive rulings on Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies would make a third of those surveyed more likely to invest. However, 56% said the new legislation would not enough be enough to make them change their mind.
The survey is reported to have indicated that the majority of those polled (60%) said that they would not support the BoE in introducing a cryptocurrency. Millennials were the only age group to say that they would back the move with just over 50% saying they would be happy to support a BoE-generated cryptocurrency.
Also, 93% of those questioned had heard of Bitcoin, and those asked if they felt optimistic about Bitcoin’s price remained the same from January this year at 39%. However, 61% thought Bitcoin’s price would decrease in value over the next six months or crash and be worthless.
Half of those polled who are investing or are thinking of investing in Bitcoin in the future would not invest in other cryptocurrencies. Rankings for other cryptocurrencies worth considering were Ethereum (20%), Bitcoin Cash (14%), Ripple (6%), and Litecoin (5%).
British Chancellor Philip Hammond recently unveiled a task force to help safeguard consumers which include representatives from the Treasury, the BoE and financial watchdog FCA. He said the taskforce would help the UK “manage the risks around crypto-assets”.
Such calls for regulation were also made recently by the Governor of the BoE, Mark Carney, when he discussed the impact of cryptocurrencies’ core technology indicating that he was not against innovation provided by cryptocurrencies, stating that regulation could potentially “serve the public better”. This following his comments that cryptocurrency “had pretty much failed” as a source of money.
