PwC Luxembourg will start accepting Bitcoin payments

PwC Luxembourg is stepping further into Blockchain and crypto-assets by accepting Bitcoin payments from its clients as from 1 October 2019, in a move acknowledging the needs of clients and the willingness of the Luxembourgish Firm to support the growing national crypto ecosystem

The Luxembourg firm strongly believes in the underlying technology as a medium to long-term standard in the economy and strives to position itself as an early adopter. The move to embrace crypto-payments is also a strong reflection of carefully listening to the growing demand from the market and PwC Luxembourg clients and offering them a secure payment alternative reflecting the evolution of our economy.

Thomas Campione, Director, Blockchain & Crypto-assets Leader, PwC Luxembourg, states: “Our role is to lead and it is only by being an active leader with exposure that we at PwC Luxembourg can understand the challenges inherent to the crypto world. It is very difficult to properly appreciate the challenges of AML/KYC-enhanced due diligence in a world made of public/private keys, with the complexity and risks of custodial solutions, or to comprehend the decentralized finance ecosystem growing “next door” without being exposed to it in its day-to-day activities.”

The Firm acknowledges the challenges of this move and has carefully reviewed its internal policies and procedures to meet the standards required by the crypto industry and closely collaborated with a local regulated exchange to provide the best payment experience.

Globally, PwC has more than 400 staff working on Blockchain. The purpose of this team is to support existing and future clients in their Blockchain and crypto-assets journey, to bridge between traditional and decentralized business, and between incumbents and Blockchain and/or crypto-born players.

The need to grow the ecosystem and build skills

John Parkhouse, Territory Senior Partner and CEO of PwC Luxembourg, stated: “The development of Blockchain technology, and the emergence of a new decentralized economy supported by the rise of crypto-assets, are heavily reliant on an individual’s ability to understand the disruptive and pervasive impact of these new concepts. Even more importantly, it depends on the ability of the ecosystem to move synchronously. Upskilling will be key and the capacity to build and grow the ecosystem will be at least as important to harvest the true benefits of the technology. This is true whether it is about dramatic cost-saving through process streamlining, improvement of social capital due to new decentralized business models, or by unlocking hidden-value currently stuck in the economy through tokenization.”