Visa CEO Reveals Bitcoin and Cryptocurrency Plans
Al Kelly, the CEO of Visa, said that the financial services company is planning to enable the buying of Bitcoin on Visa credentials. The latest statement of Kelly came after Mastercard revealed its cryptocurrency plans in February.
During his conversation at Fortune’s Leadership Next podcast, Kelly said that the company is also planning to work with Bitcoin wallets. In February 2021, Visa announced a partnership with First Boulevard, a digitally native neobank focused on building generational wealth for the Black community, to accelerate the company’s efforts to enter the cryptocurrency market.
“We’re trying to do two things. One is to enable the purchase of bitcoin on Visa credentials. And secondly, working with bitcoin wallets to allow the bitcoin to be translated into a fiat currency and therefore immediately be able to be used at any of the 70 million places around the world where Visa is accepted,” Kelly said.
Mastercard, the rival of Visa, announced earlier this year that the company is planning to accept Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency assets in 2021. Raj Dhamodharan, EVP Blockchain and Digital Partnerships at Mastercard, mentioned in an official post that the company will focus on consumer protection and compliance before the selection of cryptocurrencies.
Adoption of Bitcoin
Due to the recent surge in retail and institutional demand for Bitcoin, several financial firms worldwide have started working on the acceptance of BTC as a payment method. Tesla, the world’s largest electric-car maker recently revealed its $1.5 billion investment in Bitcoin and mentioned that the company is planning to accept BTC as a mode of payment for its products. CoinFlip, one of the leading Bitcoin ATM providers in the US, has expanded its network significantly during the last few months due to a surge in demand.
The world’s largest cryptocurrency registered an all-time high of $61,000 on Sunday. As of writing, BTC is trading near $56,000 with a total market cap of more than $1.05 trillion.
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