Posted on 03/30/2021 9:48:00 AM PDT by amorphous
PayPal, which last year added the ability to buy, hold and sell cryptocurrency, is pushing it as a payment method across the 29 million or so online merchants connected to the fintech giant.
Announced Tuesday, PayPal’s Checkout will allow bitcoin (BTC), ether (ETH), bitcoin cash (BCH) and litecoin (LTC) to be seamlessly converted into U.S. dollars or other fiat currencies when making purchases, the same as credit card or a debit card would work inside a PayPal wallet, said PayPal – meaning merchants will not actually be the recipients of cryptocurrencies.
Though the payments giant had said last year it was working on this feature, the news was enough to drive up the currencies involved, particularly BTC, which rose more than $1,000.
Calling it “a new way for businesses to get paid,” the checkout service is all about driving mainstream adoption of cryptocurrencies, said PayPal CEO Dan Schulman.
“Enabling cryptocurrencies to make purchases at businesses around the world is the next chapter in driving the ubiquity and mass acceptance of digital currencies,” Schulman said in a statement.
Cryptocurrencies are going mainstream, with banks and institutional investors taking an interest, but the utility of bitcoin and other crypto tokens when it comes to buying goods has always been limited due to their volatility.
PayPal, which made a huge splash when it officially entered the crypto space in October, wants to smooth those wrinkles out and get its wide network of merchants on board.
Since introducing the crypto service, PayPal has increased weekly purchase limits two times from $10,000 to $15,000 and then $20,000.
Visa announced this week that it was testing out payments functionality using USDC stablecoin, a cryptocurrency held at parity with the U.S. dollar, on the Ethereum blockchain, via crypto-backed Visa cards.
PapPal said its merchants will not incur any additional integrations or fees, and fiat conversions will take place at the standard PayPal conversion rates, according to a press release.
Still, the terms and conditions for “Checkout with Crypto” include a number of important caveats. Chief among them is the tax liability: “Sales of Crypto Assets via Checkout with Crypto are taxable just like all other sales of Crypto Assets.”
PayPal will provide the consumer with a 1099 tax form and report to the U.S. Internal Revenue Service as necessary, but “it is your responsibility to determine what taxes, if any, apply to transactions you make.”
The T&C also warns the Checkout with Crypto service “may not be available as a funding option for all merchants, customers or purchases.”
FYI
I get scammed every time I use PayPal!
Had 2 unauthorized charges many years ago and then just recently used them to buy a religious book from the publisher, and was soon greeted with a phony Amazon purchase claim.
I get a lot of the phishing/scamming emails to, from time to time. I use paypal for ebay and infrequent online website purchases.
Mainstreaming is happening
My first PP encounter resulted in actual charges to my VISA, which I refuted and were reversed.
In this thread: people blaming PayPal for lousy, sketchy vendors online.
Anyway, this is a good step towards adoption. PayPal needed to first establish a reserve of crypto in order to make transfers immediate, rather than waiting for confirmations. This morning it took 13 minutes for a transaction to be confirmed.
“to be seamlessly converted into U.S. dollars or other fiat currencies”
Nice, I can convert one currency backed by nothing into other currencies backed by nothing!
Good money drives out bad money...
Historically bad money drives out good money...
This is why you cannot find silver coins easily
If YOU would like to be on a CRYPTO PING LIST, please pm me.
The Crypto Ping List covers the following:
Bitcoin
Ethereum
Other coins built on the Ethereum blockchain mining
etc.
Thanks! For it - or ag'in it, it'll be a wild ride. Hat tip to amorphous!
The whole point of crypto is that it’s peer to peer. If Paypal is still going to get involved as a middle-man, what’s the point in using crypto? Might as well just stick with cash for a Paypal purchase. If you’re buying crypto to hold as an investment, you might as well buy the crypto off an exchange or from a broker. Probably cheaper.
They call those Spoofing emails and you can forward those to spoof@paypal.com and they’ll investigate and will send you a thank you email when it’s a spoof that they didn’t know about.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.