Italian Lawmaker Urges Banking Foundations to Buy Bitcoin

An Italian lawmaker is urging banking foundations in Italy to invest in Bitcoin, arguing that such investments could accelerate support for the leading crypto in the country. 

However, he doesn’t foresee Italy establishing a strategic Bitcoin reserve anytime soon, despite growing momentum in the United States on both a national and state level.

In an interview Friday with trade publication Criptovaluta, Italian parliament member Marcello Coppo said banking foundations should dip their toes into Bitcoin by allocating a small portion of their income to the digital asset to potentially reap significant returns on their investments.

A banking foundation is an organization set up as a bank that uses its funds to support social, cultural, and philanthropic activities. 

The foundations’ investments in Bitcoin could drum up public support for the coin, which has long been the object of “excessive distrust” in Italy, Coppo said. 

“We can start from where the risk is very low, and any positive tests can be used as examples and case studies,” Coppo said Friday. 

However, it’s unlikely that such investments will inspire Italy’s Treasury to embrace the asset anytime soon,  the lawmaker said.

That’s even though at least a handful of nations, including the U.S., have made serious strides toward establishing strategic Bitcoin reserves. 

“If the USA [invests in Bitcoin], it would not be science fiction for any nation [to do the same]… but I do not see the conditions for this to happen [in Italy] in a few months,” Coppo said.

The lawmaker’s call for Italian banking foundations to add Bitcoin to their balance sheets follows reports earlier this week that Italy’s largest bank, Intesa Sanpaolo, bought $1 million worth of the cryptocurrency.

The purchase comes amid a crypto market resurgence that has slingshotted Bitcoin past $100,000.

Bitcoin is trading at $104,000 at writing time, CoinGecko data shows. 

Edited by Sebastian Sinclair