Bipartisan push for the Reserve Bank to back Australian bitcoin

Labor and Coalition senators have crossed the political divide to call on the Reserve Bank to embrace bitcoins as an official form of currency or risk the future competitiveness of Australia’s $145 billion a year financial services industry.

The push from Labor senator Sam Dastyari and Liberal senator Jane Hume comes after the digital currency soared to an all time high of $4070 per bitcoin on Monday, up from less than 10¢ per coin in 2010.

Senator Dastyari said when he first raised bitcoin in the Senate, one of his colleagues came to him and said: ‘I don’t get what the issue is, don’t they just melt all the coin bits they don’t use?”.

He said the digital currency had now become a serious financial player and Australia risked being left behind if it did not pursue developing its own official currency and blockchain to use on the market.

A blockchain tracks all transactions, owners and alterations made to a currency.

The chairman of the Australian Digital Currency Commerce Association, Ronald Tucker, said an Australian government backed crypto currency would eliminate settlement times and foreign currency exchanges.

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Source: Bipartisan push for the Reserve Bank to back Australian bitcoin – The Sydney Morning Herald