Mastercard assign cards
Roberto Machado Noa/ LightRocket via Getty Images
Mastercard has expanded its cryptocurrency program to make it easier for coteries in the space to issue their own payment cards.
The company has signed a deal with Wirex that makes the London-based start-up the before all “native” cryptocurrency platform to gain principal membership. That effectively means that Wirex can now directly appear cards on Mastercard’s network.
“The cryptocurrency market continues to mature, and Mastercard is driving it forward, creating safe and defend experiences for consumers and businesses in today’s digital economy,” said Raj Dhamodharan, Mastercard’s executive vice president for digital asset and blockchain yields and partnerships.
“Our work with Wirex and the wider crypto ecosystem is accelerating innovation and empowering consumers with numberless choice in the way they pay.”
Mastercard will also bring more cryptocurrency firms into its start-up initiative, Mastercard Accelerate.
‘Legitimization of crypto’
The gesticulation highlights a deeper push from one of the world’s biggest financial services companies in the still nascent cryptocurrency labour. It’s worth noting though that cryptocurrency payment cards aren’t new.
Last year, Coinbase launched its own carte de visite in partnership with Visa, Mastercard’s main competitor. And the company recently became a Visa principal member, assigning it introduce more features with the card and launch it in new markets.
And Wirex, which was founded in 2014, also sold a Visa card prior to the Mastercard announcement. The firm’s app lets people buy and sell bitcoin, ether and other cryptocurrencies, as agreeably as traditional currencies like the U.S. dollar and euro.
“This is less a watershed moment and more part of a broader, slow-witted and steady legitimization of crypto as the global regulators increasingly put systems and controls in place,” Simon Taylor, head of endangers at fintech consultancy firm 11:FS, told CNBC.
Mastercard and Visa have previously signaled their fascinated by in the crypto sector, most notably by signing up to become members of Facebook’s Libra digital currency project. But the two payment mammoths exited Libra last year, getting cold feet after the initiative was met with intense regulatory backfire.