27 August, AtoZ Markets – It appears that cryptocurrency enthusiasts in China are seeing the move from mobile payment giants that will most likely make it hard for them to trade Bitcoin. In their latest initiative, WeChat Pay and Ant Financial’s Alipay are moving to ban cryptocurrency related transactions on their platforms.
WeChat and Alipay ban Crypto Transactions
Mobile payment titans are reportedly monitoring their platforms for transactions related to digital currencies. WeChat has announced that it would ban users from sending funds related to such digital assets on its social media platform.
According to local media sources, the Chinese platform that has been developed by Tencent has moved to block an unconfirmed number of crypto and Blockchain related accounts. The news quotes a WeChat official as stating that some of the public accounts are suspected of publishing Initial Coin Offering (ICO) and cryptocurrency trading “hype.” This reportedly violates the company’s “Interim Provisions on the Development of Public Information Services for Instant Messaging Tools” terms.
In addition, the official stated that the company has received orders to block all content and also permanently block the associated accounts. The interim provisions that WeChat official referred to rules that were only recently introduced by the Cyberspace Administration of China.
Alipay will not manage virtual currency transactions
In the meantime, Ant Financial, which is supported by Chinese tech company Alibaba, has stated that it has been limiting some of the account associated with cryptocurrency transactions on its payments platforms for some time now. Alipay is believed to have around 520 million users, while WeChat has about 1 billion monthly active users.
Ant Financial has released an official statement:
“Alipay has always adhered to the principle of not providing services to virtual currency transactions. We will continue to closely monitor over-the-counter trading activities on a daily basis. Once we find any suspicious crypto-related transactions, we will take appropriate measures immediately, including but not limited to: suspension of fund transfer functionality of any Alipay accounts used by companies for crypto-related transactions.”
China Bans Foreign Crypto Exchanges
This news appears as the Chinese government has continued its clampdown on cryptocurrency market-related fraud this year. The country has already restricted local exchanges and initial coin offerings. It is now reportedly planning to block overseas cryptocurrency exchanges via its Great Firewall.
Earlier last week, AtoZ Markets reported that financial regulators in China decided to block more than 100 foreign cryptocurrency exchanges that are providing trading services to residents in China.
The official news outlet of Chinese financial regulators, Shanghai Securities Times has reported that the China National Fintech Risk Rectification Office has spotted 124 trading platforms that have overseas IP addresses and operate in the country.
The office has decided to improve its efforts to monitor the sector and moved to block the internet access to these cryptocurrency trading exchange platforms. According to the report, the National Fintech Risk Rectification Office is a government agency that is responsible for managing the financial risks that are connected to the issues related to peer-to-peer lending and cryptocurrency trading.
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