Blockchain.com wallet introduces interest accounts

o_e_l_e_o

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Quote from: LeGaulois on June 30, 2020, 11:22:42 AM

-snip-

I wouldn't be at all surprised if the "selected, rigorously vetted" borrowers turned out to be anyone who has completed their KYC procedures.

The word "Institutional" is presumably supposed to lend credibility. After all, when have institutions ever ripped off the average Joe!? Roll Eyes

How long have blockchain.com been offering lending for? Because I thought it was a fairly new thing for them, meaning the borrowers cannot have "established track records" unless blockchain.com have been buying personal information regarding loan amounts, lengths, repayments, etc., from other companies.

At no point have I seen anything from blockchain.com which states they will cover your losses if the borrower defaults on their loan. This is your money they are gambling with. They are taking some of the profits and assuming none of the risk.

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OK, 3-4 days ago they published this page on the FAQ

Quote

We are able to offer a competitive interest rate to users who deposit and hold bitcoin with us. We do this by lending bitcoin deposits out to selected, rigorously vetted institutional and/or sophisticated borrowers who have established track records at a slightly higher rate

What are they calling "institutional and/or sophisticated borrowers" and "established track records"?
1)Track records from?
2)Why institutional borrowers would use this platform to borrow while there are more established services doing it (better)?

On the screenshot posted by @OmegaStarScream earlier it seems everyone (verified I suppose) is able to borrow money (See the "borrow" tab). Or he's an institutional and sophisticated borrower.

3) How are they "selecting" borrowers?

Are they really lending money, I start to wonder

4)With this feature, aren't they supposed to have either a license or regulated from abcd, since it starts to look more similar to a financial institution?
I mean something like Nexo.io, it's regulated

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Quote from: pooya87 on May 31, 2020, 02:38:14 AM

Quote from: TryNinja on May 29, 2020, 11:45:23 AM

FreeBitco.in pays a little less (4.08% annually) but they do not require any verification (if people care about leaving BTC in third parties for 4%/year).

^ this. obviously in both options you would be giving up control over your funds but i personally trust freebitco.in a hundred times more than i trust blockchain.com specially since the later is known to be a buggy platform with a lot of issues which developers who are too lazy to fix them for long times. eg. there are bugs that have existed for years in blockchain.com!
the minimum balance for profit in freebitco.in is also a lot smaller at 0.00030000 BTC ($2-$3 at current price).

For whatever reason, I also trust freebitcoin more (and I have been earning interest with them for a very long time already). They pay daily, and have never ever delayed my withdrawal for years.

I think many people will go for blockchain.com now with this option but they are just selling their KYC to do that.

pooya87

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with the recent news about Coinbase coming out that they have been selling their users data and are planning on selling it more to the government agencies we now are sure that there is a good market for these things.
so it is not surprising that another company, that is blockchain.com, is now aiming to take their share of that market to add some additional revenue.

and it is not just for money, it will also be for security since they will be working for the government. for instance when they are caught doing something illegal in the future, the US government will easily bury the investigation and let them get away with it to keep their source intact.

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Quote from: pooya87 on June 02, 2020, 10:57:01 PM

this is starting to look more like a KYC accumulation. i was always skeptical about blockchain.com ever since they started adding KYC to their platform with that shady altcoin giveaway they did a while back and ever since then they have been adding more and more KYC stuff and "incentivizing" people into "selling" them their personal information.

Yeah, i do remember that XLM thing and never ever in my life i do consider on giving out any documentations regarding on my identity just to have that interest benefit or any other purposes.

Quote from: bitmover on May 29, 2020, 02:32:13 PM

Quote from: o_e_l_e_o on May 23, 2020, 03:45:41 AM

The huge downside is obviously the custodial nature. 4.5% isn't high enough for me to risk any of my bitcoin being held by a third party.

I agree... Bitcoin itself already has a high potential upward moviment.

Risking it all to earn 4.5% more is not worth. Even if it were 10%. There is no need to add more risk for a little extra gain.

I will not lend my bitcoins to anyone

I do prefer the same thing on why would need to use 3rd parties just to get 4.5% annual if you can get even more by just holding your own coins into your own wallet?
Lets say its fixed but im not really that confident or would have a good night sleep if i do have some coins on others wallet.

o_e_l_e_o

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Let's take a quick look at what they might do with your KYC documents.

People they will share your data with:

Quote from: https://www.blockchain.com/legal/privacy#collect_of_personal

Companies within the Blockchain corporate family located in the United States and the United Kingdom, in order to provide the Services to you.
Cloud service providers to store certain personal data and for disaster recovery services, as well as, for the performance of any contract we enter into with you.
...
We may transfer your Personal Data outside the EEA and the UK to other company subsidiaries, service providers and business partners (i.e., Data Processors) who are engaged on our behalf.

So any of their subsidiaries, and any third party companies they hire to provide a service to them or store and process your data on their behalf. So pretty much anyone they like.

Quote from: https://www.blockchain.com/legal/privacy#collect_of_personal

We will make reasonable commercial efforts to ensure that they comply with such policy or requirements, however, where not expressly prohibited by law, we will have no liability to you, if any person fails to do so.

If one of these third parties decide to sell your data (as was the case with Coinbase) or are hacked for your data (as was the case with Binance), Blockchain.com will take no responsibility.

Even if you think every member of staff at Blockchain.com can be completely trusted, what about all the staff at every unknown third party they currently use or will use in the future? Do you really want your KYC documents stored on the cloud by an unnamed and unaudited "cloud service provider"? It's impossible to count the number of times that cloud servers have been hacked or compromised.

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Quote from: pooya87 on June 02, 2020, 10:57:01 PM

this is starting to look more like a KYC accumulation. i was always skeptical about blockchain.com ever since they started adding KYC to their platform with that shady altcoin giveaway they did a while back and ever since then they have been adding more and more KYC stuff and "incentivizing" people into "selling" them their personal information.

Plus, we don't know whether exchanges like Blockchain.com secure our documents and personal details with the same amount of security as traditional banks. I believe banks do more to stop personal data from being stolen than Blockchain.com, and your average wannabe exchange is even worse in this regard such that it is a nightmare to imagine the lack of security there. There are laws already in place criminalizing bank fraud, but when we examine exchanges, theft of bitcoins held in exchanges usually goes unhandled, and the sheer number of scams that target exchange wallets is a testimony to this.

None of that is worth it for a petty 4.5% interest rate.

Quote from: TryNinja on May 29, 2020, 11:45:23 AM

FreeBitco.in pays a little less (4.08% annually) but they do not require any verification (if people care about leaving BTC in third parties for 4%/year).

As a gambling platform they routinely handle large sums of deposits and withdrawals which makes me feel more comfortable holding money there. Just make sure you play their lottery sometimes Wink

pooya87

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this is starting to look more like a KYC accumulation. i was always skeptical about blockchain.com ever since they started adding KYC to their platform with that shady altcoin giveaway they did a while back and ever since then they have been adding more and more KYC stuff and "incentivizing" people into "selling" them their personal information.

LTU_btc

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Very long article with lot of not needed information and not much about interest accounts.
Here I found some FAQ. about interest accounts:
https://support.blockchain.com/hc/en-us/categories/360003244552-Interest-Account
So, to enable interest feature, you must have Gold level account. It means that you have to pass full KYC verification. And you must have at least $300 in your account to start getting interest.
After all, 4.5% isn't bad, compared to what banks are offering. But at least for me it's not worth to sell my personal date and keep large number of BTC on web wallet in danger.
Crypto web wallet is probably last place where I'm going to do KYC.

rdbase

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Their terms and minimums do leave something to be desired looking at the other vast options available.

Just received another email from them today. I knew I shouldnt of upgraded my blockchain wallet to gold because they just spam your inbox everyday when theyre trying to promote something. Noticed this the last time around late last year). Peter Smith sent the following link on how they are expecting 1billion wallets by 2030. Embarrassed

https://medium.com/blockchain/the-blockchain-com-2020-experience-325ab80e2d88
They are really pushing this due to an increased pressure from direct competition in the recent months it seems. Embarrassed

batang_bitcoin

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It's also appearing on my account there but I don't like their terms, I think we all agree of disliking it.

Quote from: https://support.blockchain.com/hc/en-us/articles/360043658491-How-the-Interest-Account-works

The Interest Account is a custodial savings balance within your Wallet that earns interest on the amount you deposit and store in it.

Quote from: https://support.blockchain.com/hc/en-us/articles/360043221552

Keep in mind that, due to market conditions, the interest rate may go up or down while your funds are in the account. We will inform you of the change via email and you can always check the current interest rate for your account in the account details as well (accessible in the Earn Interest tab of your wallet) and withdraw or deposit more at any time.

Might better hold it on my own rather than risking it to them, just my opinion though.

pooya87

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Quote from: TryNinja on May 29, 2020, 11:45:23 AM

FreeBitco.in pays a little less (4.08% annually) but they do not require any verification (if people care about leaving BTC in third parties for 4%/year).

^ this. obviously in both options you would be giving up control over your funds but i personally trust freebitco.in a hundred times more than i trust blockchain.com specially since the later is known to be a buggy platform with a lot of issues which developers who are too lazy to fix them for long times. eg. there are bugs that have existed for years in blockchain.com!
the minimum balance for profit in freebitco.in is also a lot smaller at 0.00030000 BTC ($2-$3 at current price).

rdbase

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I received the same email from blockchain.com (peter ceo himself Cheesy

) in their newsletter a couple of days ago about this offering of 4.5% interest rate on holding your bitcoin in the wallet.
I have a gold account with them and will test it out for comparative reasons and will post my results on the forum in a month on another wallet with similar if not better rates which I just signed up with last night. After much hesitation because it was too good to be true, which everybody knows probably is. Embarrassed

They do not require you to have $300 locked up and it can be $1 worth if you want to get that higher rate.
Plus you do hold your own private keys which I do not believe blockchain.com wallet allows you to do this. Which is why I verified with them since their is an earned level of trust when a wallet gives you this choice in the first place. Wink

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Quote from: o_e_l_e_o on May 23, 2020, 03:45:41 AM

The huge downside is obviously the custodial nature. 4.5% isn't high enough for me to risk any of my bitcoin being held by a third party.

I agree... Bitcoin itself already has a high potential upward moviment.

Risking it all to earn 4.5% more is not worth. Even if it were 10%. There is no need to add more risk for a little extra gain.

I will not lend my bitcoins to anyone

TryNinja

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FreeBitco.in pays a little less (4.08% annually) but they do not require any verification (if people care about leaving BTC in third parties for 4%/year).

OmegaStarScream

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Quote from: o_e_l_e_o on May 23, 2020, 03:45:41 AM

The interest accounts were only announced 2 days ago, so I would expect it to be a few weeks before they are implemented yet. They also won't be available in the US, Canada, or Japan upon launch. The blog post also says the following (emphasis mine):

-snip-

So yeah, it will be a few weeks before this is all rolled out. It doesn't seem to be a partnership with Celsius as you asked, but rather, just funded from their own in-wallet lending program. The huge downside is obviously the custodial nature. 4.5% isn't high enough for me to risk any of my bitcoin being held by a third party.

It's available now. I just checked my account:

You will need to verify your identity (as expected) and to have at least 300$ in your account before being able to earn interest.

See the support page: https://support.blockchain.com/hc/en-us/categories/360003244552-Interest-Account

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This will certainly be interesting for those who use online wallets anyway, and we know that there are a lot of them. So if you already accept the risk, then at least you can be rewarded with some amount for your loyalty. 4.5% is definitely not something that people will make deposits for, but given the situation with the banks, some may still take a risk because it is a fairly respectable company.

I think that this option will probably bring them new customers, and as far as I can see they are preparing some more new things and improvements. If beginners choose this service for their first step, then they should at least get the best possible service until they decide on the second step and some desktop/hardware wallet.

o_e_l_e_o

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The interest accounts were only announced 2 days ago, so I would expect it to be a few weeks before they are implemented yet. They also won't be available in the US, Canada, or Japan upon launch. The blog post also says the following (emphasis mine):

Quote from: https://medium.com/blockchain/the-blockchain-com-2020-experience-325ab80e2d88

In addition to all of these new features, you can now manage your wallet and all of your other accounts in one, unified experience. Given that the wallet is non-custodial, whilst features like Interest Account and the Exchange are custodial, it’s useful to see a snapshot of your account balances all in one place — so you’re always in control of your crypto. We’ll be rolling out this unified experience in the coming weeks and we’re excited to see it in the hands of our customers.

I also found this with a quick internet search:

Quote from: https://coinfomania.com/blockchaincom-add-usdt-offer-bitcoin-savings/

According to a sneak peek provided by Blockchain.com, the new savings product will see users earn 4.6 percent APY on their Bitcoin holdings while the company uses these funds for on-venue lending to provide the promised returns.

So yeah, it will be a few weeks before this is all rolled out. It doesn't seem to be a partnership with Celsius as you asked, but rather, just funded from their own in-wallet lending program. The huge downside is obviously the custodial nature. 4.5% isn't high enough for me to risk any of my bitcoin being held by a third party.

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Quote from: batang_bitcoin on May 22, 2020, 08:41:27 AM

I checked my wallet and referred to the posted GIF image on that article with the "Interest Accounts" but there's nothing on my account that says the same feature. The borrow feature is visible but that interest thing, there's none. There is no update button notification for that feature, maybe they posted the article earlier but haven't yet added the feature.

It's not available for me either. I even tried to make another account using a different IP address (thinking that it has something to do with my location) but it still didn't show...

I agree, I don't think they pushed the update yet, because if you check the support page, there is a mention for the borrowing but not the interest accounts.

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Quote from: LeGaulois on May 22, 2020, 07:29:19 AM

I'm checking blockchain.com's website and I'm unable to find any page related to this. I need to know if it's done with the same partnership or not. Anyone can post a screenshot of their account with this feature or show me this fucking page URL? :/

I checked my wallet and referred to the posted GIF image on that article with the "Interest Accounts" but there's nothing on my account that says the same feature. The borrow feature is visible but that interest thing, there's none. There is no update button notification for that feature, maybe they posted the article earlier but haven't yet added the feature.

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According to the latest blog post, they launched their interest accounts for members deposits if they're interested to earn 4.5% interest annually. (It's not the main news of the article but there is a paragraph about it). And apparently members can also borrow money there.

Bitwala launched the exact same product this week through a partnership with Celsius Network and roughly the same rate. (see here)

I'm checking blockchain.com's website and I'm unable to find any page related to this. I need to know if it's done with the same partnership or not. Anyone can post a screenshot of their account with this feature or show me this fucking page URL? :/

(PS: I know people will say better to cut the middle man to earn a bigger interest, which is true but not what I'm looking for)

Topic: Blockchain.com wallet introduces interest accounts (Read 1151 times)