Jay Kotak backs Anand Mahindra, says 'regulation of crypto urgently needed in India'

After Mahindra Group chairman Anand Mahindra busted fake claims surrounding his investment in cryptocurrency, the latest business mogul to join the awareness campaign is Jay Kotak, Associate VP of Kotak Mahindra Bank. Taking to Twitter on Sunday, Jay Kotak, who is the son of billionaire banker Uday Kotak, stressed on the urgent need to regulate crypto in India. Jay Kotak stated that the lack of controls and maliciously incentivised advertising surrounding cryptocurrency could be a 'disaster' in the making, adding that keeping aside good and bad of the system, many were investing in crypto markets without understanding which could potentially 'blow up'.

Jay Kotak's response came in relation to a tweet put out by Anand Mahindra earlier this week. Sharing screengrabs of reports which claimed that he has made tons of money using a cryptocurrency investment platform, Anand Mahindra on November 19 revealed that he has not invested a single rupee in cryptos. The screenshots of the fake report shared by him had claimed he made money using a crypto coins auto-trading programme 'Bitcoin Era'. It also quoted him saying that he is making tens of thousands of dollars on the auto-pilot mode. Busting the fake news, Mahindra said that it was important to make people aware that the report was completely fabricated and fraudulent. 

Cryptocurrency bill soon, PM Modi chairs meeting

It is expected that the Centre will usher in a bill on cryptocurrency in the upcoming Monsoon session of the parliament. On November 13, PM Modi chaired a meeting on the way forward for cryptocurrency with a special focus on the issue of misleading non-transparent advertising regarding the same. As per sources, this meeting was conducted after a consultative process done by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the Finance Ministry and the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA).

Accessing exclusive details of the Cryptocurrency Bill likely to be introduced soon, Republic TV has learnt that the Centre will slot cryptocurrency as an 'asset class' - which is a group of instruments that have similar characteristics and are governed by the same regulations. This implies that cryptocurrencies may be treated as other tradeable assets like stocks and bonds. While it might not recognise it as legal tender, it has ruled out a blanket ban on it. The bill is also expected to bring in additional restrictions to take into account extra instability in blockchain technologies which affect the prices of cryptocurrency.