Head of Vancouver crypto exchange says Canadian regulation could soon come

VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – Crypto currency is a phenomenon which shows no signs of dying out, and one which may end up being more closely regulated here in Canada in the coming year, according to a Vancouver-based exchange.

Michael Vogel, the CEO of Vancouver-based crypto exchange Coinstream, says he’s been seeing a rise crypto excitement.

“There’s never a dull day in the crypto world,” he told NEWS 1130, adding there’s no sign that interest will slow down in the near future.

Noting the recent spike in value of what was once a joke crypto, Dogecoin — which is now valued at over $50 billion — Vogel says it’s very difficult at this point to say how long the excitement will continue, adding a lot of people thought Bitcoin had become “old news” just last year.

“Are we at end times when it comes to the bull market? That’s still up for debate. But there’s still a lot of energy, a lot of institutional money that has entered the bitcoin world,” he explained. “People ask me, ‘Where do you see the price of Bitcoin going over the next month or the next week?’ It’s getting harder to predict.”

And while retail investors still dominate the crypto market, Vogel anticipates this is likely to change. He suggests there could be more regulation coming down the line in Canada over the course of the coming year to make the currencies more legitimate and useable as an actual currency.

That would make institution, like banks, potentially more willing, to provide crypto currencies as investment products.

“I’ve heard of instances where [investors] go to Royal Bank and say, ‘I’d like to buy some bitcoin,’ and the bank will tell them no, or they will block them from doing it,” Vogel said.