Interview: Raj Bagadi (ScallopX)

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has undoubtedly confronted the whole world with an unprecedented challenge, but, at the same time, it has turbocharged a technology revolution worldwide.

Perhaps for this reason, 2020 has been one of the best years ever for crypto currencies. We have seen not only a surge in the price of most crypto currencies, among them Bitcoin, but we have also seen institutional investors become more interested in investing in cryptos. We have also seen companies like PayPal launching a new service enabling users to buy, hold and sell cryptos, as well as traditional banks like DBS launching a digital currency exchange that will allow investors to trade in cryptocurrencies and firms to raise funds through asset tokenisation.

Given the importance that cryptos are acquiring, we interviewed Raj Bagadi, Founder and CEO of ScallopX.

ScallopX is a UK-based company that aims to be a one-stop solution for users who want to make Cryptocurrency trading and Banking services in a faster and more efficient way, with the goal of bringing Crypto Currency into mainstream use. ScallopX is he first decentralized crypto banking service provider that allows users to trade cryptocurrencies directly from any supported Hardware wallet.

What makes ScallopX different from the other companies in the industry?

ScallopX is first Non centralised crypto bank application , where users store their tokens with them in their cold wallets and using the scallop application they buy, sell and trade whenever and where they want instantly. Major differences are below. PayPal offering crypto store and crypto transfer to PayPal users only.

We recently saw PayPal launching a new service enabling users to buy, hold and sell cryptocurrency. Do you think that banks, especially virtual banks, will gradually become more interested in offering crypto related services in the near future?

Yes, as the interest in crypto grows steadily: mobile and virtual banks will add crypto storage system to their services. In the coming 5 years, high street banks will start adopting crypto as part of their services.

2020 has been a great year for cryptos: we have, for example, seen Bitcoin’s price surge more than 200% this last year. What do you think will happen in 2021?

Cryptocurrency usage has been gaining traction within mainstream finance over the last decade. 2020 has been a great year for Cryptocurrencies. We saw the rise of the price of the value of a Bitcoin from $7900 in December of 2019 to $23500 by December 2020 making it one the highest returns on investments compared to any other investments in the market. Alongside Bitcoin, Ethereum and other similar tokens have also gained in value in a similar vein. Having said that, there is expected to be a fall the value of Cryptocurrencies of about 25% in early 2021. These expected falls will be mainly due to sell-off by investors to realise the gains they have accrued.  However, due to the take up of investments by institutions in the Cryptocurrency market, prices are expected to rise again. This means that there is a high chance the Bitcoin market cap could hit $1 trillion by end of 2021 or early 2022 which could potentially drive the value of Bitcoin to $54000.2021 is expected to usher in a new chapter for Cryptocurrencies. The Cryptocurrency market is expected to attract a lot of interest from lay investors and intuitions.  This will directly lead to a rise in the use of blockchain in everyday transactions thus removing the barriers that exist between traditional fiat and Cryptocurrencies. New blockchains like Solana and Cardona will help pave the way for new applications, which include ScallopX, to bring blockchain technology into mainstream use. This will also mean that the adoption of Cryptocurrencies for daily transactions will become more feasible and easier thus enabling ScallopX to offer the services we plan to roll out.

Traditionally, institutional investors have been quite wary of investing in crypto currencies, even though this tendency might be changing now. Do you think that this change in tendency will continue? Why do you think institutional investors are becoming interested in investing in cryptos now?

As per CME group they had a 583-bitcoin contract in 2017 which now increased to 6000 bitcoin contracts in 2020. Most of the new contracts are owned by institutions . The raise in institutional intrests in crypto currency is because of raise in user interest . Now people are more aware of crypto currencies and recent surveys shows a 54%-increase in interest of investment in crypto currency . This growth interest increasing the value of several tokens including bitcoin giving highest ROI. With the growth in technology and platforms targeting intuitional investors, it is evident that the industry is gearing for big money to enter into the market. This new decade of 2021 will mark the acceptance of crypto as a new asset class.

What do you think of the current rise of Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs)? Do you think that CBDCs and cryptos may be perfectly compatible?

Several countries have taken concrete steps or announced their intentions to launch a CBDC. As a digital currency, a CBDC’s most obvious benefit is faster, cheaper, and more efficient payments, both domestically and cross-border. The major difference I see between CBDCs and crypt is Crypto always varies its price with respect to a stable currency where it can be CBDCs dollar or any fiat. CBDCs are like stable fiat coin issued directly by the government on blockchain system. This major difference always keep crypto as a best investment asset. CBDCs might take time to launch but eventually once they launched all the trading pairs will become crypto to CBDCs in all exchanges.

Regulators across the globe struggle to keep up with the maddening pace of balancing state of the art technology with the use of traditional regulatory schemes. While some countries like Singapore are permissive with cryptos, others have banned it. To you, what would be the ideal regulatory approach to crypto currencies?

Technology is evolving everyday and with the increase in new ways of using crypto in everyday live, the gap between fiat and crypto will reduce soon. As a result, countries need to adapt with the change in use of digital and crypto currency.  Because crypto doesn’t have any boundaries, there should be a global regulatory which will be accepted by any country. Regulations will create binary virtual asset ownership thus making more investment into crypto which increase the value and usage of crypto. A global regulatory will solve the problem, but this might take some time to happen.