Crypto Credit Card Usage Hit $2.5 Billion During First Quarter: Visa

Crytpo credit card usage hit $2.5 billion during the first quarter and despite the volatility on the crypto markets, according to the latest data by Visa so let’s find out more in our latest cryptocurrency news.

The adoption of crypto as a means of payment seems to be rising. In an earning scall, Visa stated that the customers made $2.5 billion in payments using the crypto credit cards in the first fiscal quarter of 2022 which is over 70% of the crypto-card volume in fiscal 2021 which signals an increased adoption of the digital asset payments.

The VISA CFO Vasant Prabhu expressed optimism over the development in an interview with CNBC and said:

“To us, this signals that consumers see utility in having a Visa card linked to an account at a crypto platform.”

In the first half of 2021, only $1 billion was spent in crypto using Visa’s cards, and while comparatively small this is still a fraction of the crypto spending volume that it processed in 2019 though CNBC reported that Visa still didn’t release an exact number at the time. Crypto-linked cards allow customers to spend crypto anywhere that accepts Visa without the merchants having to be familiar with the asset classes. They receive transactions in fiat like typical Visa transactiosn while the payment processor handles conversion at the back end. Prabhu said:

“People are using their crypto-linked cards to spend in a variety of ways—retail goods and services, restaurants, travel. They’re increasingly being treated as a general-purpose account.”

The company announced that it expanded the number of partnerships for facilitating the service from 54 to 65. these include companies like Circle, BlockFi, and Coinbase. Visa demonstrated a broad interest in expanding the industry and its adoption as a whole and the company even launched a crypto-consultation service in December for the clients to get financial institutions involved with the asset class. The payments giant also partnered with Micah Johnson to educate the artists on how NFTS can monetize art.

As recently reported, Consensys and Visa partner to build a payment infrastructure for CBDCs and a pilot program that will explore retail applications like wallets and cards. Both companies will first meet with 30 central banks to discuss the goals of their governments and the goals to achieve with central bank digital currency. The pilot program is scheduled to start during the spring of this year.