Barclays strikes payment deal with cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase in the UK

Glassdoor/Coinbase

A puppy in Coinbase's San Francisco office.

• Barclays agrees to offer cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase access to UK's Faster Payments Scheme.
• The deal comes after Coinbase gained approval from the UK's financial regulator.
• The UK is Coinbase's biggest market in the EU and is growing fast.
• Coinbase plans to increase staff numbers in London by eight times to meet demand.

LONDON - Barclays has agreed to provide US cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase with access to the UK's Faster Payments Scheme in a first for the bank and for an exchange in the UK.

Coinbase is gaining access to the Faster Payment Scheme, the core payment infrastructure used by consumers to move money in the UK. Coinbase's UK head Zeeshan Feroz confirmed to Business Insider that the company was partnering with Barclays on the deal.

"There is no other exchange today that has access to domestic banking," he said. "UK consumers today have to jump through all sorts of hoops around sending money to European accounts using euros in order to get money in and out."

Faster Payments will allow Coinbase's UK customers "to see a vastly improved deposit and withdrawal experience," Feroz said.

The deal represents the first major partnerships between a UK bank and a cryptocurrency exchange. Many traditional lenders are reluctant to work with cryptocurrencies due to their anonymity and potential for use in laundering money.

Feroz said Barclays "approached it with the right mindset" and closely scrutinized Coinbase's compliance processes. An e-money license from the UK's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), also announced on Tuesday, helped get the deal done.