Union Bank Launches Bitcoin and Ethereum Trading for Retail Customers in the Philippines

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UnionBank of the Philippines has launched a pilot program to introduce crypto asset custody and trading services to its customers. Through cooperation with Metaco, a Swiss technology company, UnionBank will soon offer its retail clients services for trading Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH), the latter of which is currently available to customers of OTC trading platforms. UnionBank is one of Asia’s leading financial services companies. It has been at the forefront of crypto adoption in the country, ranking among the best universal banks in terms of profitability and efficiency. Metaco is a Swiss technology company founded in 2015 to enable financial and non-financial institutions to securely manage their digital asset operations. UnionBank also recently announced plans to launch a crypto-asset exchange. The bank’s digital asset division will focus on the Philippine peso-bitcoin trading pair and tokenization of Philippine assets. On November 2, Metaco declared that UnionBank had gone live on its flagship platform, Harmonize. Harmonize is the digital asset platform developed by Metaco for Union Bank. Seamus Donoghue, Chief Growth Officer at Metaco, said Metaco’s Harmonize enables UnionBank to explore a variety of digital asset use cases such as crypto custody and investment and trading. UnionBank also announced that it is partnering with crypto exchange Luno to offer crypto-to-fiat trading for its customers. The Philippine government plans to adopt blockchain technology to improve its digital banking and transaction systems. This was announced at a conference attended by Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos, who emphasized the importance of adopting such technology for the country’s financial sector. Henry Aguda, Chief Technology & Operations Officer and Chief Transformation Officer of Union Bank hailed the partnership as “being the first regulated bank in the country to allow digital currency exchange functionality for customers.”Through another announcement, Metaco President and CEO Roberto S. Ong said the company’s role in providing customer-centric services to the Philippine market is critical to the bank’s goal of providing customer-centric services nationwide.In a speech published in September 2022, Ferdinand Marcos referred to several milestones achieved by UnionBank, including: “UnionBank’s track record in creating opportunities through innovation and digital solutions in the banking sector is undisputed.”Shashank is the founder of yMedia. He ventured into crypto in 2013 and is an ETH maximalist.