On 3 November last year, Commonwealth Bank of Australia (ASX: CBA) earned its spot in the virtual history books.
If you own CBA shares, you may recall that was the date the bank announced it would begin to offer crypto services to its 6.5 million customers, a first in Australia.
In a partnership with Gemini and Chainalysis, customers will be able to use the CommBank app to trade and hold Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC), Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) and a basket of other cryptos.
Commenting on the bank's decision to roll out a crypto service at the time, CBA CEO Matt Comyn said, "We believe we can play an important role in crypto to address what's clearly a growing customer need and provide capability, security and confidence in a crypto trading platform."
And Gemini's global head of business development, Dave Abner said at the time of the announcement, "The exponential growth of digital assets internationally, coupled with Gemini's institutional-grade security and proactive regulatory approach, positions this partnership to set a new standard for banks and financial platforms in Australia and across the globe."
Now, however, CBA's crypto rollout is facing regulatory delays.
Image source: Getty Images
What's happening with the bank's crypto services?
As the Australian Financial Review reports, CBA's crypto rollout is being held up by regulatory hurdles.
The bank is in discussions with a range of regulators, including the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), the Australian Taxation Office (ATO), AUSTRAC and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.
ASIC is scrutinising CommBank's "product disclosure statement, the target market for the product and consumer protection".
Commenting on the matter at The Australian Financial Review Cryptocurrency Summit, ASIC commissioner Cathie Armour said, "We're interested in any sort of new innovation where we think there's real benefits of innovation being within our regulatory regime. There are a bunch of rules there that you need to follow."
How have CBA shares been performing?
CBA shares have gained 22% over the past 12 months, handily outperforming the 8% gains posted by the S&P/ASX 200 Index (ASX: XJO) in that same period.
At the current price, CBA shares come with a 3.6% trailing dividend yield, fully franked.
