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Bitcoin fell on Monday after Lloyds Bank (LON:LLOY) announced a ban on buying cyrptocurrencies using customer credit cards.
The ban is set to apply to Lloyds Bank, Bank of Scotland, Halifax and MBNA customers. The ban does not extend to debit cards.
Across the course of 2017, the value of Bitcoin managed to top the 12,000 mark, a remarkable 1,500 percent rise since the start of the year.
However, in recent months, the cryptocurrency market has proved particularly volatile with its value more than halving in recent weeks.
The plunge has prompted concern that customers may run up large debts should the currency continue to fall.
A Lloyds spokeswoman said of the decision: “We continually review our products and procedures and this is part of that.”
The decision follows similar measures by regulators in the US, China, Russia and India.
The German Bundesbank also called for global efforts to regulate bitcoin, echoing similar concerns voiced by France’s finance minister.
Moreover, last month South Korean officials renewed market concerns about a global government crackdown on decentralised currencies.
This proved a blow to the market leading cryptocurrency, considering that South Korea accounts for almost 20 percent of its total transactions.
Cryptocurrencies continue to be highly controversial, and particularly volatile, motivating the move towards greater regulation by Lloyds Bank. It is unclear whether other banks will also follow suit.
Last month at the World Economic Forum in Davos, mobel prize-winning economist Robert Shiller said Bitcoin will not be “permanent feature” of the financial markets and is likely to “totally collapse”.
Robert Shiller likened the cryptocurrencies unlikely momentum to the“tulip-mania” that once occurred in The Netherlands.
For the most part, regulators and governments alike remain concerned about the potential for the currencies to be exploited by criminal networks and the dark web.
The untraceable and decentralised nature of Bitcoin and its rivals has led to criticism from industry titans such as JP Morgan’s Jamie Dimon, and most recently, UBS Chairman Axel Weber.
However, Mr Dimon has since expressed regret that he dismissed Bitcoin as a “fraud” which is only fit for use by “drug dealers, murderers and people living in places such as North Korea”.
Last month in an interview on FOX Business Network, the CEO said about his previous comments: “I regret making them”, noting that he is “not interested in the subject at all”.