Stephen Sikes, Public’s chief operating officer, said customers never had access to the FTT token on their platform, adding it was not broadly listed by firms in the US. He said it was the firm’s responsibility to make clear to its members that the “crypto industry is a viable one” and that “not every not every participant can be painted with the same broad brush.”
‘Fairly Scary’
Fintechs that steered clear of the crypto wave also have concerns about the FTX blowup.
Klarna Chief Executive Officer Sebastian Siemiatkowski, who has previously criticized the crypto industry, described the situation as “fairly scary” in an interview with Bloomberg TV on Monday. He raised fears that FTX’s collapse may encourage regulation that obstructs new firms from competing against traditional lenders “to the disadvantage of consumers.”
FTX’s failure is an unsettling but necessary part of the crypto market growing up, according to Jeff Tijssen, Bain & Company’s global head of fintech.
“It has become a bit of a wild west, and the fact that businesses can operate out of the Bahamas without any decent degree of regulatory oversight is a big part of the issue,” he said.
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.