Major banks, including
, have cut off crypto exchanges for about a month and have directed payment gateways to stop services to merchants involved in crypto trades.
“For now, we are processing some deposits manually, which is slower, and we are implementing some new deposit solutions which should be online very soon. The demand by Indians to be able to invest in crypto has never been greater,” said Vikram Rangala, chief operating officer of crypto exchange ZebPay.
DigitX, another crypto exchange, has set up online and offline transaction modes and is in the process of setting up peer-to-peer channels as well.
“We have set up banking on-ramps with prominent service providers in that area, and are also setting up a strictly verified and validated P2P channel,” said Ashish Mehta, cofounder of DigitX.
The exchange is also working with mid-sized banks and “one of the most prominent payment gateways,” he said, without revealing names due to the ongoing regulatory uncertainty over cryptocurrency.
Earlier this month, Paytm Payments Bank deposits were disabled on several exchanges due to the extra load on its servers.
The service was later restored but only for the platform’s existing users, according to a senior executive of an exchange that was impacted.
Other crypto exchanges like Unocoin, Bitbns and CoinDCX are accepting rupee deposits through Mobikwik’s digital wallet.
“Our customers can deposit using Mobikwik wallets or net banking through the same payment gateway or else by sending money to our bank account,” said Sathvik Vishwanath, cofounder and CEO of Unocoin. “We are not using any of the payment gateways that are supported by ICICI Bank.”
A few crypto exchanges, which were evaluating an integration with Mobikwik, had veered away from it owing to the higher per-transaction cost charged by the wallet provider, according to senior executives at multiple crypto exchanges.
“The higher charges ultimately affect users,” the chief executive of a crypto exchange, who is evaluating the integration, said.
“At the end of the day, these are temporary solutions that will stop working sooner than later. This is not the ideal experience we want to provide to new users,” said another senior executive of a crypto exchange.
Mumbai-based CoinDCX integrated Mobikwik into its platform over a year ago.
According to the websites of crypto exchanges Bitbns and CoinDCX, the Mobikwik wallet charges a transaction fee of 1%-1.5% plus GST.
Mobikwik did not respond to ET’s queries on the transaction charges.
Nischal Shetty, founder and CEO of cryptocurrency exchange WazirX, told ET that the platform was urging banks to join hands with crypto exchanges by educating them about the Supreme Court’s ruling reversing an RBI ban on crypto trading.
“One of the banks which was trying to see if they can work with us requested for a detailed statement of transactions that happen on the platform. So, we have summarised and provided that,” Shetty said on ET’s podcast – The Morning Brief.
The business departments of banks want to work with the exchanges, but the compliance teams are reluctant, he added.
