Dive Brief:

• Mastercard has introduced a crypto credential that enables cryptocurrency holders to transact without using long and complex blockchain addresses, the payments giant announced Wednesday.
• Using the service, customers in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, France, Guatemala, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland and Uruguay can make domestic transfers and send cross-border payments using various currencies and blockchains, the card network said.
• The new crypto tool lets customers identify the digital assets and blockchains supported by the recipient. Mastercard plans to extend the offering beyond cryptocurrencies to include non-fungible tokens, ticketing, and other payment services, according to the company’s press release.

Dive Insight:

“Mastercard continues to invest in its technology, standards and partnerships to bring safe, simple and secure payments to the forefront,” Walter Pimenta, Mastercard’s executive vice president of product and engineering in Latin America and the Caribbean, said in the release. “As interest in blockchain and digital assets continues to surge in Latin America and around the world, it is essential to keep delivering trusted and verifiable interactions across public blockchain networks.”

Mastercard piloted its new crypto service with the Brazilian crypto wallet company Foxbit, which also said Wednesday in a separate release that it’s issuing a new card. Other partners in the effort include Bit2Me, Lirium and Mercado Bitcoin.

Foxbit aims to make managing digital assets more accessible, and more usable, the company’s chief executive officer, Ricardo Dantas, said in the joint release with Mastercard. “This is an important step in strengthening our presence in the cryptocurrency market,” Dantas said with respect to working with the card company.

Crypto wallet users who request new Mastercard credential will have access to it on a first come, first served basis, with availability for some seven million users in “coming months,” Mastercard said in the release. A spokesperson for Mastercard said he couldn’t be more specific about the timing, and didn’t have an outlook for whether, or when, the new crypto tool might arrive in the U.S. 

Before introducing its crypto tool, Purchase, New York-based Mastercard has made other efforts to provide simple and secure cryptocurrency services. In April 2021, the company partnered with the crypto exchange Gemini to issue a Gemini credit card that offered Bitcoin, Ethereum and other digital currencies as rewards. Later that year, the company acquired the crypto security firm CipherTrace to aid customers in understanding and managing their digital currencies and associated risks. 

Similarly, larger card network rival Visa last year also showed a commitment to working in the crypto sector, despite the collapse of crypto exchange FTX and other failures in the digital currency space. In September, the company integrated the Solana blockchain and merchant processors Worldpay and Nuvei into a stablecoin initiative it began in 2021. 

In addition, Visa, as well as digital payments pioneer PayPal and tech giant Google, have entered partnerships to simplify the process of owning and transacting with cryptocurrencies, according to a CB Insights report this month. “So far this year, Visa, Google, and PayPal have all formed partnerships aimed at making it easier for customers to hold and spend crypto,” CB Insights said in a May 21 email.

That report also highlighted Mastercard’s collaboration with Fideum to develop more blockchain infrastructure.