Is cryptocurrency about to go mainstream?
With new cryptocurrency regulations pending aimed at boosting consumer confidence in digital currency, and attracting entrepreneurs and investment, we ask a Gloucestershire expert what it all means.
Dear readers,
Welcome to Monday’s edition of The Raikes Journal.
Today we take a look at the world of cryptocurrency. Interest in digital currency in the UK is growing - both from consumers and businesses - and as the Government looks for any lever to pull to stimulate growth, it’s reached for this one.
The Chancellor was in London recently unveiling draft legislation aimed at protecting those already dabbling in crypto, to try to encourage more of is to follow them, but also to try to send a message to the sector’s biggest digital currency trading platforms that the UK wants them to set up shop here.
The question is, has has legislation got the balance right?
Is it going to encourage more of us to step forward and use the likes of Bitcoin, Ethereum, Tether or XRP witrh confidence? Is going to entice those major platforms to set up shop here in the UK? Or is it all just good PR for the fintech industry?
We talk to Gloucestershire expert Joe David, of Nephos, and get his view about the potential gamechanger. David’s also written us an expert insight piece that explores the subject of in even more detail, and we think that’s also well worth a read.
The main article reveals a world where investors under 40 are already heavily involved in digital currency - despite the lack of protection, whereas the older investors is steering well clear.
Best regards,
Andrew Merrell (editor).
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Celebrating its 40th year this year, The Nelson Trust is determined to do it in style - and to involve as many of us as possible. On Thursday, 3 July 2025, the Five Valley’s hadquartered charity will be holding what it’s calling its Summer Soirée of Entertainment at Woodchester Mansion in Gloucestershire, sponsored by Murrays Estate Agents and supported by Leeper Prosser and The Mortgage Branch. Tickets are £75 with the evening including a tour of the historic mansion, live jazz and classical music, wine tasting and a mix-a-mocktail demonstration - the latter courtesy of Woodchester Valley Vineyard. There’ll be canapés from Mary Rose too. More here.
Expert insight: Why crypto currency is fast-becoming a valuable tool for business
New legislation from Government aims to change how we all view cryptocurrency, not just as a source of investment but as a valuable tool for business, Joe David, of Nephos Group, explains in an exclusive expert insight article. David’s accountancy firm has particular expertise in all things crypto and as well as contributing to the main article below, he was good enough to give us his insight. Not least that he and his colleagues are having an increasing number of conversations centered around cyypto - not as a speculative investment, but as a practical tool for businesses. More here.
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Is cryptocurrency about to go mainstream?
With new cryptocurrency regulations pending aimed at boosting consumer confidence in digital currency, and attracting entrepreneurs and investment, we ask a Gloucestershire expert what it all means.
By Andrew Merrell.
One scenario that for some suggests a utopian future in which entrepreneurs can grow their businesses unfettered, is a world where cryptocurrency is mainstream.
But it’s a dream that can only step towards reality if consumers are afforded the same protection they enjoy in all other legitimate financial markets.
New regulations could mean that is about to happen.
The digital currency sector is already growing at the rate of 24 per cent a year in the UK and is expected to be worth $3.7 billion by 2028.
According to the Government just four per cent of us owned or used cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin in 2021, but by 2023 that figure had reached 12 per and it’s still rising, among investors and businesses.
Keen to send a message to businesses looking to invest that the UK is open to their entrepreneurial ways - and to stave off the reported exodus aboard of entrepreneurs - any lever the Government can pull is worth pulling.
Which is why it’s published draft legislation on cryptocurrency sector, unveiled by Chancellor Rachel Reeves at a major summit in London to mark UK Fintech Week, she described it as ‘clear new rules to give investors confidence and protect consumers’.
If you don’t use crypto yet, this may all sound a little niche, but many in Gloucestershire do.
Joe David of Gloucestershire accountancy firm Nephos, an expert in digital currency, news of the draft legeslation is worth paying attention to.
“It will help build confidence and it is needed. The UK needs to send out the right messages to show it is a place where people can invest and that they are welcome. That sense has been thin on the ground recently.
“I have conversations with people almost every day who are fed up and looking to leave the UK or have relocated,” said David, whose firm advices a growing number of businesses who increasingly see cryptocurrency as a useful tool.
Raikes also spoke to a Gloucestershire independent financial planning about crypto too.
George Taylor, of Gloucestershire-based Biscoe Financial Planning, said investors under 40 who seek his advice are often already heavilly committed to cyrpto, despite the lack of protection and volatility of the currency.
The older generation, he said, were steering well clear.
David’s own firm, Nephos, is a case in point about how the UK needs to change if it is to benefit from the growing cryptocurrency sector.
Founded and based in Gloucestershire his business is now a global operation, but it has also established offices in Dubai because of the proliferation of crypto-related business there and customers in need of advice from Nephos.
The United Arab Emirates’ city has embraced blockchain with open arms, attracting in businesses and considerable wealth and opportunity as a result.
It’s what the UK Government also wants a piece of.
David (pictured below) and his team are increasingly in demand offering guidance proactively and reactively for Nephos customers.
The firm’s name is taken from the ancient Greek word nephologist – someone who studies cloud data and predicts future weather patterns.
While the Government’s emphasis is on how its new regulations could help protect investors it’s also pretty clear the goal is to attract into the UK some of the biggest players in the sector.
In a statement the Government said: “Under the new rules, crypto exchanges, dealers and agents will be brought into the regulatory perimeter — cracking down on bad actors while supporting legitimate innovation.
“Crypto firms with UK customers will also have to meet clear standards on transparency, consumer protection, and operational resilience — just like firms in traditional finance.”
But it also said its target was firms offering services for cryptoassets like Bitcoin and Ethereum with the aim of “boosting investor confidence and driving growth”.
“Through our Plan for Change, we are making Britain the best place in the world to innovate — and the safest place for consumers.
“Robust rules around crypto will boost investor confidence, support the growth of fintech and protect people across the UK,” said Reeves, who also talked about ‘greater collaboration on digital securities between the UK and US’.
Taylor, whose firm Biscoe Financial Planning is based in Cheltenham, said: “As financial advisors we see a really polarised picture.
“Investors who come to us who are under 40 have already embraced crypto. That might be as high as 30, 40 or 50 per cent of their portfolio in cryptocurrency.
“Whereas those over that age don’t want anything to do with it.”
Is the young generation wrong?
“It is worrying. I would rather see that closer to one per cent or lower. There is no protection.
“It screams of ‘recency bias’. Getting them to switch to a more traditional investment, that might produce eight or 10 per cent a year when they have been getting 30 or 40 per cent is difficult.
“I am not allowed to advise on crypto yet, but my worry would be that their investment could be wiped out. They would be young enough to start again, of course, but the risk is huge.”
On the other hand, with the high returns some had been able to get, Taylor could also see the attraction.
It’s this that the regulations will seek to help address.
“Whether the regulation will have the desired effect for the Government to achieve everything it wants, it is too early to say. It is only in a draft form at the moment,” said David.
“For retail investors, good regulation will encourage the sceptic to get involved and become a convert.
“But when I look at the impact it could have on businesspeople, that’s when I start to become sceptical myself about the potential impact.
“The Government doesn’t have to go as far as they have here in Dubai, for example (in terms of de-regulation), but if you overregulate it will kill the market too, and businesses will continue to go elsewhere.”
What he does know is that currently, especially after the last Budget, if anything can be done to change how some already view the UK generally as a place to invest it will be worth doing.
But it’s not all doom and gloom, and neither has he fallen out of love with the UK.
“It is where I am from. I want it to do well. And it is viewed as a very good place to live and work by many still.
“But I see it as a bit like a football club with a good reputation that has lost its winning ways.
“I’m a Man United (football) fan. The club is not in the best place currently, but it is still loved and admired around the world.
“But that won’t last forever, and at some point even the most loyal fans will lose some of that passion if it does not start performing again.”
Reeves herself is in no doubt how she wants the direction of travel to be perceived. The draft document, she said, “sends a clear signal: Britain is open for business — but closed to fraud, abuse, and instability”.
The Chancellor said the Government would publish the first-ever Financial Services Growth and Competitiveness Strategy on 15 July, alongside her Mansion House speech.
This would, she added, support the financial services sector’s long-term growth, with Fintech identified as a priority sector, and help it finance investment and growth across the UK.
The Government said it would bring forward final cryptoasset legislation at the earliest opportunity, following engagement on the draft provisions with industry.
Put simply(ish), Cryptocurrency (or Crypto) is used to describe any form of digital or virtual currency that uses cryptography to secure transactions, making it nearly impossible to counterfeit.
According to datacity.com “Instead of relying on banks, cryptocurrency uses a peer-to-peer system that enables anyone across the world to send or receive payments, with transactions recorded in a public ledger or blockchain.
“The first and most popular cryptocurrency, Bitcoin was founded in 2009, leading to a boom in other currencies, including Ethereum, Tether and even Dogecoin.”
The UK cryptocurrency market is projected to see substantial growth in the coming years, with estimates suggesting a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 6.94 per cent from 2025 to 2033.