By Samuel Indyk
Investing.com – The price of Bitcoin jumped back above $57,000 on Monday morning after Reuters reported that Visa (NYSE:V) is to begin allowing the use of cryptocurrency USD Coin to settle transactions on its payment network.
The programme has been launched with crypto platform Crypto.com and Visa said they plan to offer the option to more partners this year.
USD Coin
The USD Coin is a digital stablecoin whose value is pegged directly to the US Dollar and runs on the Ethereum blockchain. Each USD Coin is backed by a US Dollar held in reserve. As of March 26th, 11.0bln USD Coins were in circulation, according to Circle, the founder of USD Coin.
“We see increasing demand from consumers across the world to be able to access, hold and use digital currencies,” said Cuy Sheffield, Visa’s head of cryptocurrencies. “And we're seeing demand from our clients to be able to build products that provide that access for consumers.”
The announcement by Visa will remove the need to convert digital coins into traditional money for a transaction to be settled.
Corporate moves into crypto
The latest news from Visa follows its largest competitor Mastercard Inc (NYSE:MA) also announcing a foray into the digital asset space earlier this year.
In February, Mastercard announced they would start supporting select cryptocurrencies directly onto their network this year.
“We are here to enable customers, merchants and businesses to move digital value — traditional or crypto — however they want,” said Mastercard in a statement.
Other companies, including Bank of New York Mellon (NYSE:BK), PayPal Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:PYPL) and Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) have also announced plans regarding digital assets.
Last week, Tesla said they would be accepting Bitcoin as payment for vehicles after previously announcing a $1.5bln purchase of Bitcoin to diversify their reserves. Tesla’s CEO Elon Musk also confirmed the electric vehicle maker would not be converting Bitcoin used as payment into fiat currency.