Cryptocurrencies Are PayPal’s Key Growth Engine, CEO Says
- PayPal recorded a net profit of $1.10 billion in Q1 2021.
- CEO David Schulman said its crypto efforts have been hugely successful and that PayPal will roll out a digital wallet in Q3 2021.
PayPal CEO Dan Schulman. PopTech, Kris Klug/Flickr
According to PayPal’s Earnings Release, the company’s net profit increased from $84 million in Q1 2020 to $1.10 billion in Q1 2021. The hugely successful quarter also brought in 14.5 million new active users, increasing its total user base to 392 million. Revenue saw an increase of 31% year-over-year.
Dan Schulman, the CEO of PayPal, said that cryptocurrencies have been a key growth engine for the company in the past year. The company launched its crypto efforts in October 2020, enabling U.S. customers to buy, sell, and hold BTC, ETH, BCH, and LTC on its platform. Earlier this year, the company enabled its U.S. customers to use cryptocurrency from their PayPal wallet as a form of payment at millions of its online merchants around the globe.
“We’ve got a tremendous amount of really great results going on tactically with our crypto efforts,” he explained on the company’s earnings call. Schulman also said that half of PayPal’s crypto users visit their apps daily, noting that the crypto option increases engagement for its customers.
To further bank on the popularity of its crypto services, PayPal also announced it will roll out a “next-generation” digital wallet in Q3 2021. The product will be an “all-in-one, personalized app [that] will provide increasingly customized and unique shopping, financial services, and payments experiences,” Schulman revealed.
- PayPal USD (PYUSD) will be issued by Paxos and the Ethereum blockchain, and is backed by U.S. dollar deposits, short-term Treasuries, and similar cash equivalents.
- The company said the stablecoin can be redeemed for U.S. dollars at all times, and exchanged for any other crypto supported by the platform, including BTC, ETH, BCH, and LTC.
PayPal logo and sign in front of PayPal Holdings headquarters building in North San Jose Innovation District in Silicon Valley, San Jose, California, USA, 17 March, 2019. Michael Vi/Shutterstock
- The new funding will help Chaos Labs build out and expand its suit of risk and security products that can help DeFi protocols.
- The seed funding round was co-led by PayPal and Galaxy Digital, but also saw participation from including Coinbase Ventures, Polygon, Avalanche, OpenSea, Uniswap, and others.
- PayPal’s new app will provide a personalized view of the customers’ account balance, wallet, payments, and finances.
- The improved mobile application will bring a slew of features to its users, including direct deposits, bill pay, a digital wallet, crypto capabilities, and more.