Visa is to Use Cryptocurrency for Payment Settlements

Visa, the credit card company, announced that it will allow the use of the cryptocurrency USD Coin to settle transactions on its payment network, the latest sign of growing acceptance of digital currencies by the mainstream financial industry.

Visa has chosen USD coin and its network to settle transactions in their payment network, as per financial news provider Reuter. Visa briefed that pilot program between payments and crypto platform, Crypto.com had launched. And by the end of this year, it plans to include more options exist in the market.

You may remember the news when Bitcoin (BTC) set a new record for the year 2021 in March and surpassed 61K.

Visa expressed the volatility of BTC by addressing that news.

The involved cryptocurrency, USD Coin, is a stable coin whose ups and downs are tied directly with a paper currency, the U.S. dollar.

Master Card Inc., Black Rock Inc., and BNY Mellon already favored the use of virtual currency for investment and payment purposes. It seems like Visa was inspired by these firms and thought to follow the trend.

Like it or not, cryptocurrencies have become everyday things after facing too many barriers in the beginning. Another renowned car company, Tesla, has also allowed payments in Bitcoin. The company’s owner, Elon Musk, is the strongest believer of blockchain. That’s why he encouraged crypto involvement in the business.

By expressing reasons behind Visa’s decision to include cryptocurrencies, crypto head, Cuy  Sheffield, adds, “We see increasing demand from consumers across the world to be able to access, hold and use digital currencies and we’re seeing demand from our clients to be able to build products that provide that access for consumers,”

Let’s suppose a customer wants to pay for coffees using the Visa card of Crypto.com. Digital currency equal to the bill amount needs to be deducted from the wallet, converted into traditional money, Right?

To come to that end, first, the Crypto Wallet will transfer fiat money, e.g., USD, direct to the bank wired with the Visa. Then, transactions committed in a day will be settled at the end of the day.

In order to settle the transactions faster in the network, Visa is now on the road to integrating Ethereum blockchain in its network. This move will prevent Visa from the pain of converting money into local currency.

The company’s association with digital asset bank, Anchorage, has succeeded and the very first transaction has committed in March – USDC was successfully transferred at Visa’s Ethereum address sent by Crypto.com.