Aussie cryptocurrency exchange to trial BPAY's Osko

Cryptocurrency exchange BTC Markets is trialling BPAY’s Osko service as a way to speed up conventional fiat deposits from customers.

The company said it would support Osko, which runs as an overlay on Australia's new payments platform (NPP), which went live in mid-February.

The billion-dollar NPP allows banks to send payment messages in real time to each other via the Reserve Bank.

In a brief statement, BTC Markets said it would trial Osko for deposits only, but that it expected the service to also support withdrawals within a few months.

Osko presents an opportunity for cryptocurrency exchanges to support much faster deposits of fiat currency into their ecosystems, which can then be traded for digital currency.

Particularly since the cryptocurrency boom of late 2017, digital currency traders have complained about the delay in using traditional BPAY and other banking services to deposit Australian dollars into their cryptocurrency accounts.

Such deposits typically take a few days to show up, by which time trading opportunities can be missed, due to the volatility of cryptocurrency prices.

Exchanges have looked to other payment gateway services in order to speed up the process.

Some have been using POLi Payments, though this option has had issues because it requires users to reveal their online banking username and password in order to operate.

CoinJar uses an alternative service called Blueshyft, which allows traders to deposit cash directly into their cryptocurrency accounts, mostly from newsagents or other such outlets.