Visa, FTX team up to offer debit cards in 40 countries

Global payment processor Visa has partnered with crypto exchange FTX to offer its debit card service to customers in over 40 countries.

The partnership will enable FTX customers to convert their cryptocurrencies into fiat, by simply linking the Visa card directly to their custodial account. Visa and FTX will complete the conversion process in the backend.

With inflation figures of countries like Turkey and Argentina reaching a high of 83% and 78% respectively, the companies said they are looking to focus on emerging markets across Latin America, Asia, and Europe.

FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried said that the partnership will make it easier for merchants to accept cryptocurrencies and drive crypto’s utility beyond being a speculative asset class.

On a lighter note, Bankman-Fried told CNBC that cryptocurrencies were designed to disrupt traditional payment systems, it is however interesting to see that banks and payment companies are embracing the technology.

“It is a technology that we absolutely see disrupting traditional payment networks,” Bankman-Fried added. “I respect the fact that many of them are leaning into it.”

Visa CFO Vasant Prabhu said that though the crypto market has gone down by over 50% in 2022, customers are still interested in cryptocurrencies, with more holding stablecoins in their crypto accounts.

Payment giants flocking to crypto

As of date, Visa has teamed up with over 70 crypto platforms including Binance, to allow customers to spend cryptocurrencies across 80 million merchants globally.

Payment giant Mastercard has also been gaining ground in the crypto ecosystem. It partnered up with Coinbase to allow users to purchase NFTs directly with their Mastercard debit and credit cards.

PayPal announced earlier in June, that it had deployed a payment gateway for U.S.-based users to easily transfer, send and receive cryptocurrencies.