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Why the UK should have the best crypto startup ecosystem in the world

UK government

Will Orde, investor at Oxford Capital, on why the UK should have the best crypto startup ecosystem in the world; and why we should care about entrepreneurs, not the price of bitcoin.

Cryptocurrencies are rarely far away from the headlines. Against a backdrop of continued regulatory uncertainty, we’ve seen the bull run of late 2017 come to a shuddering halt, giving way to big price drops, while mainstream financial services haven’t yet worked out how best to engage with crypto.

In the UK, we’ve had continued talk about regulation, but no new rules yet. The latest was Mark Carney’s warning “The time has come to hold the crypto-asset ecosystem to the same standards as the rest of the financial system.” City Minister John Glen has taken a gentler line, however, promising proportionate regulation, and a cross-body crypto task force has been setup with a balanced mandate of managing the risks and harnessing the upside....