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One of the biggest financial institutions based in the United Kingdom (UK) is blocking all crypto transactions on its bank cards.
In a new post, UK banking titan Barclays says it is barring all digital asset-related transactions on its proprietary payment cards starting on June 27th due to the volatile price of cryptocurrencies and because they are uninsured assets.
“It’s not possible to make cryptocurrency transactions using a Barclaycard. From 27 June 2025, we’ll block crypto transactions made with a Barclaycard because we recognize there are certain risks with purchasing cryptocurrencies.
We’re doing this because a fall in the price of crypto assets could lead to customers finding themselves in debt they can’t afford to repay. There’s also no protection for crypto assets if something goes wrong with a purchase, as they’re not covered by the Financial Ombudsman Service and Financial Services Compensation Scheme.”
However, despite the recent ban on crypto assets, previous reports indicate that Barclays has invested hundreds of millions of dollars into IBIT, BlackRock’s Bitcoin (BTC) exchange-traded fund (ETF), which launched in January 2024 and is currently the largest BTC-based ETF by trading volume.
In February, the bank disclosed to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that it holds 2,473,064 shares of IBIT, worth nearly $137 million at the time.
IBIT is trading at 60.98 at time of writing, representing a 1.5% increase over the last 24 hours.
