Visa to Issue USDC Credit Card
- The stablecoin-enabled credit card will be the child of Visa’s new partnership with Circle.
- The latter will work closely with the payments giant in selecting credit card issuers, who will need to integrate the USDC software into their platforms.
VISA sign at the company’s global headquarters in Silicon Valley in Foster City, CA, USA on 24 August 2019. Shutterstock
Financial giant Visa is pushing for crypto adoption and will soon see its payments network of 60 million merchants connected to the U.S. Dollar Coin (USDC), Forbes reported on 2 December.
According to the publication, the developer of the digital currency, Circle Internet Financial, will work closely with Visa to help it select credit card issuers, who will integrate the USDC software into their platforms. Circle is currently going through Visa’s Fast Track program, and is expected to graduate sometime next year. Once that happens, the first USDC credit card will be issued, which will enable businesses to send and receive USDC payments directly to any business using the card.
Even though the credit card giant is opening its payments network to the digital currency, no USDC will be under Visa’s custody. The Head of Crypto at Visa, Cuy Sheffield, confirmed the news on Twitter:
“We’ve been closely following the growth of stablecoins for the past two years and I’m super excited for Visa to partner with Circle to help them connect USDC to our global network.”
Sheffield also pointed out that all firms on-boarded through Visa’s Fast Track program will be eligible to pilot the new USDC integration; this includes the 25 crypto wallet providers that have already completed the program. The USDC integration will provide “additional value” to all digital currency wallets that Visa has worked closely with, Sheffield stated.
Yesterday, Visa announced it will be offering its clients a credit card that will reward purchases with Bitcoin rather than cashback, thanks to a partnership with BlockFi. Issued by Evolve Bank & Trust, the “Bitcoin Rewards Credit Card” will give users 1.5% of their fiat purchases back in BTC, which will be deposited directly into their BlockFi accounts.
- The digital ID project said Orb Operators received USDC payments as part of the project’s transitional phase after launch, and now that it is nearing its end Worldcoin will be switching to WLD payments.
- Worldcoin warned Orb Operators to check if they can claim rewards in their region as WLD are not available in the United States and “certain other restricted territories”.
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- SVB Financial Group has filed for a Chapter 11 court-supervised reorganization in the U.S. in order to “preserve value”.
- The company stressed it is no longer affiliated with Silicon Valley Bank, the closure of which sent ripples across the crypto industry.
- Despite the events of last week, Circle has been able to clear almost all USDC backlog, and redeemed $3.8 billions USDC between March 13 and March 15.
- The stablecoin issuer also went live with a new transaction banking partner for both domestic and international wires, and expects to bring more capabilities back soon.