By Anthony Morgan

The public will soon be able to trade cryptocurrencies on the Jamaica Stock Exchange (JSE). The disclosure was made by Manager of Bond Trading, Equity and Stockbroking at Victoria Mutual Wealth Management, Denise Marshall-Miller, on the latest episode of Taking Stock with Kalilah Reynolds.

Manager of Bond Trading, Equity and Stockbroking at Victoria Mutual Wealth Management, Denise Marshall-Miller

Marshall-Miller said VM Wealth and its partners are working to make that happen as early as this summer.

“I’m thinking this could be within the 3rd quarter of this year the latest…. We are working with our regulators and we’re awaiting approval to start to offer this to our clients…. As soon as we receive this approval then we will commence,” she said.

Cryptocurrency is a decentralized form of digital money powered by blockchain technology. Among the most popular are Bitcoin, Ethereum and Dogecoin, but there are over 5000 different cryptocurrencies in circulation.

Jamaica’s Crypto Connection

Jamaica has its own connection to Dogecoin.  Back in 2014, over US$25 million was raised using Dogecoin to send the island’s bobsled team to the Winter Olympics. Both Dogecoin and Bitcoin are completely in the hands of the public.

Marshall-Miller said the process to buy cryptocurrency on the local stock market would involve a broker who would act as the middleman. The activity would be powered by Blockstation, an end-to-end digital asset trading platform. The JSE had signed an agreement with Blockstation in 2019. That master agreement enables live trading of digital assets and security tokens in a regulated and secured environment.

“A lot of work has been put in for the past three years and now we’re at the final stage,” said Marshall-Miller.

Bypassing the System

With some local financial insitutitions blocking Jamaicans from transferring funds into their cryptocurrency coin wallets online, a number of Jamaicans have been using their credit cards to beat the system and make purchases. However, they are often faced with higher fees and are exposed to other risks.

Marshall-Miller said VM Wealth’s solution will allow Jamaicans to feel safe handling those digital dollars.

“There’s the whole risk of your wallet being stolen, the hacking etc. The system we’re looking to bring to Jamaica via the JSE is an ecosystem in the sense that the trading, the settlement and the storage is done seamlessly,” she said.

She added that companies looking to raise funds will also be able to come to the market in the form of a Securitized Token Offering (STO), a replication of the traditional Initial Public Offering (IPO). However, unlike IPOs, money for an STO can also be raised beyond Jamaica’s borders.

“I think that’s really revolutionary for the whole crypto market to bring this to the fore,” she said.

CEO of E.Chapman Group Toronto, Earl Chapman, who recruited Blockstation to present the platform to the JSE, said Jamaica stands to reap significant benefits with the creation of a digital asset exchange. 

CEO of E.Chapman Group Toronto, Earl Chapman

“What we’ve built in Jamaica is the whole process of being able to come to a broker dealer, to being able to open an account like you would do for a normal transaction and then be able to buy and sell whatever we’ve decided to put out there,” he said.

Bitcoin’s Sudden Surge

This is not the first attempt to bring cryptocurrency trading to Jamaica.  In 2016, the UK-based CARICOIN was among the first stakeholders hoping to launch a licensed Bitcoin exchange in the island. According to CEO of CARICOIN, Karsten Becker, the company was in talks with the Bank of Jamaica (BOJ); however, no licenses were issued by the Central Bank, forcing the company to shift its focus elsewhere.

Becker, who also appeared on Taking Stock, said increased regulations across the world for the crypto market have given investors confidence and contributed to the spike in interest and its overall value in the past year.

He projected that the most popular cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, will likely be worth over a million US  dollars in the next 4-5 years, with institutions like banks and hedge funds investing money into it. Bitcoin is now valued around US$57,000. Just a year ago it was worth US$8,000.  According to a report by Deutsche Bank, Bitcoin is now the world’s third largest currency.    

“We’ve seen the market go from a couple million dollars five years ago to over $2 trillion now, so anybody who invested in crypto last year and the years before would have made a lot of money,” he said. 

Ethereum and DeFi

Becker believes Ethereum will be the next cryptocurrency to follow Bitcoin in value. That, he said, has been powering the smart contract revolution and a whole new market of decentralized financing.

CEO of CARICOIN, Karsten Becker

He said that while cryptocurrency doesn’t have the institutional money behind it, it’s also cutting out the middle man with its technology, and enabling persons to trade money for a variety of financial services including peer to peer loans and insurance policies.

Based on his company’s data insights, Becker said another area to watch in the space is DeFi, short for Decentralized Finance, which is emerging due to their involvement in peer to peer loans.

He said as this new ecosystem grows and takes over from traditional systems, the value of the market will continue to set new records. At the same time, he’s cautioning persons interested in the crypto market to evaluate their plans before tapping in.

“The value of crypto can increase or decrease with time. If you’re a day trader, there’s a lot of volatility so probably not the best market to be in unless you’re very savvy, but if you’re looking at it as a long term investment, then from personal experience I’d say it probably is the best place to put your money,” he said.

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