Italian banking giant UniCredit has been asked to pay a fine of about $144 million for allegedly closing accounts belonging to a cryptocurrency mining company.
UniCredit in hot water
A district court in Banja Luka, Bosnia and Herzegovina, has ruled that UniCredit’s branch in the country will pay a fine of 131 million euros ($144 million) in damages following a lawsuit legal action brought by a subsidiary of the crypto-mining company Bitminer Factory. Local media La Repubblica first reported the story.
Bitminer Factory’s subsidiary accused UniCredit of wrongfully closing its current accounts held in the bank’s local branch in Banja Luka. According to the crypto mining firm, the closure “prevented the Initial Coin Offering (ICO) associated with startup projects in the cryptocurrency mining sector using renewable energy in Bosnia and Herzegovina.”
The company set up mining operations in Bosnia and Herzegovina due to the country’s low energy tariff and opened bank accounts with UniCredit. While the bank previously allowed them to withdraw profits from the sale of mined cryptocurrency to their accounts, the UniCredit subsidiary has stopped, saying it cannot service cryptocurrency businesses and providers .
However, the court stated that the bank could not present evidence of any written rules which prevented the financial institution from forming a business relationship with crypto-based firms.
Meanwhile, UniCredit appears unhappy with the decision and has reportedly appealed the judgment. According to the bank, the condemnation “is neither final, nor binding, nor enforceable”, adding:
“Possible liability will be determined only by the definitive outcome of all available procedural remedies and not before the filing of a definitive and binding sentence by the appeals court.”
Major banks are opening up to crypto
In January, the Italian banking giant received backlash from the cryptocurrency community as well as customers following a response to a Twitter user. UniCredit noted:
“Hello, the current Group policies prohibit relations with counterparties issuing virtual currencies or acting as exchange platforms.”
There have been several cases of banks refusing to handle accounts belonging to crypto holders. In 2021, European giant HSBC blocked transactions from digital asset exchanges in the UK.
However, there are other major banks who seem to have changed from an anti-crypto stance and are offering such support.
As previously reported by CryptoPotatoAustralia’s largest bank, the Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) has announced that it will offer more crypto services to the bank’s customers.
