Jamie Dimon, the CEO of J.P Morgan Chase, the largest US bank, has recently hinted the financial institution’s stablecoin JPM Coin could one day be used for retail payments.
Speaking during a question-and-answer session, Dimon revealed the potential use case. He was quoted as saying:
JP Morgan Coin could be internal, could be commercial, it could one day be consumer
Earlier this month, J.P Morgan became the first large financial institution to issue its own cryptocurrency, which was designed to settle transactions between its clients, with a specific purpose to be used in international payments and to migrate securities transactions to the blockchain.
As the financial institution’s website notes there are no plans for JPM Coin to be accessible to individuals, some believe Dimon’s comments are speculative. The company’s cryptocurrency is, so far, only being tested in a trial within the bank and its corporate clients.
Notably, Dimon was one of the bitcoin’s biggest critics when the flagship cryptocurrency was rising back in 2017. Among other things, he claimed the cryptocurrency was a “fraud,” before claiming he doesn’t “give a s—t” about it.
In June, Dimon along with Warren Buffet told investors to “just beware” of BTC. Interestingly, in August, the CEO claimed he “probably shouldn’t say any more about cryptocurrency.” This, after revealing he believes the biggest threats to the bank are “new forms of payment,” including PayPal, Venmo, and Alipay.
JP Morgan’s head of blockchain projects, Umar Farooq, at the time of the stablecoin’s launch revealed its applications are “quite endless,” as “anything where you have a distributed ledger which involves corporations or institutions can use this.”
Initial use case he cited as examples included international payments for large corporate clients, securities transactions, and giving clients that use J.P Morgan’s treasury services business the ability to “replace the dollars they hold in subsidiaries across the world.”
The cryptocurrency is redeemable for US dollars, and the bank’s clients can get it “after depositing dollars at the bank. Once JPM Coins are used for payments or security purchases, the bank “destroys the coins and gives clients back a commensurate number of dollars.”
