Cryptocurrencies: Switzerland has lost interest, says Bitcoin Suisse CEO
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According to Bitcoin Suisse, Switzerland’s importance as a hub for cryptocurrencies has declined in recent years. Politicians, too, are showing almost no interest in the subject, says CEO Andrej Majcen in an interview with the financial news agency AWP.
The Zug-based company is currently relocating a number of operations and jobs abroad.
Bitcoin Suisse has analysed over recent years where cryptocurrency adoption has taken place globally and how the regulatory framework has evolved, says Majcen. “In this ranking, Switzerland no longer features among the top countries.”
For this reason, the company – regarded as a key pillar of “Crypto Valley Zug” – is now relocating a number of its operations. In Switzerland, 60 of the 120 jobs are being cut, as announced in September.
Bitcoin Suisse positions itself as an “international financial services provider” and is focusing more on wealth management for institutional clients and high-net-worth individuals, explains Majcen. Furthermore, with these relocations, the company aims to significantly reduce its costs.
“In the long term, our high cost base in Switzerland simply doesn’t make sense,” says Majcen. For example, back-office activities can be carried out at the company’s headquarters in Bratislava, Slovakia, where wage costs are in some cases 60–70% lower.
Once a hub of the sector
As recently as the 2010s, “Crypto Valley Zug” was regarded as one of the hubs of the cryptocurrency world. The token sale by the Zug-based Ethereum Foundation, carried out with the support of Bitcoin Suisse, served as the model for the ICO (“Initial Coin Offering”) boom. This phenomenon reached its peak in 2017, when billions poured into companies in the cryptocurrency sector.
+ Switzerland’s ‘Crypto Valley’ looks past cold market winds
“In Zug at the time, you couldn’t go into any restaurant without bumping into someone from the cryptocurrency world,” says Majcen. Cryptocurrencies were also all the rage in politics. Government ministers such as Ueli Maurer and Johann Schneider-Ammann were then working hard to promote Switzerland as a hub for cryptocurrencies, and even the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA), under the leadership of its then director Mark Branson, had shown itself to be strongly in favour of innovation.
By contrast, very little has happened in Switzerland over the last five or six years, notes Majcen. “We’ve noticed that cryptocurrencies aren’t a priority in Switzerland.” During the same period, other markets abroad have established their own regulatory frameworks.
Even at the Federal Palace, at least since the UBS-CS affair, there is hardly any attention paid to the issue, according to Majcen. “Quite simply, hardly anyone is interested in it anymore.”
Analysis of the Binance attack
The CEO of Bitcoin Suisse does not expect the recent theft of billions from the Binance cryptocurrency exchange to lead to a long-term loss of confidence in the sector. The incident relates to the operational security of a single company, says Majcen. It does not provide any new insights into the technology itself.
Last week, hackers believed to be from North Korea stole cryptocurrencies worth around $6.3 billion (CHF5.16 billion) from the world’s largest crypto platform. Binance has since reimbursed customers for around 95% of the stolen funds by drawing on its own reserves.
“Looking at the communications provided so far by the Binance team, I have great confidence that the incident will be handled transparently and that relevant information will be made public,” says Majcen.
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Translated from Italian reviewed by an English Department journalist.
