Widely-used stablecoins need to be regulated like money, BoE's Bailey says

LONDON (Reuters) -Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey said on Wednesday that any stablecoin that becomes widely used as a means of payment in Britain needs to be regulated like standard banks, with depositor protections and access to BoE reserve facilities.

Bailey - a long-standing sceptic about cryptocurrencies - wrote in an article in the Financial Times that it would be "wrong to be against stablecoins as a matter of principle".

But he said their main current use as a way to enter and exit cryptocurrency trades did not amount to a standard money-like means of payment.

Bailey confirmed the BoE would publish a consultation paper on stablecoins in the coming months.

"In doing so, we will set out that widely used UK stablecoins should have access to accounts at the BoE in order to reinforce their status as money," he said.

(Reporting by David Milliken; Editing by Kate Holton)