In a move that could be a game changer for cryptocurrency real world application and daily use, crypto exchange Coinbase has teamed up with the biggest global payments processor Visa to launch a Coinbase debit card. Now users can spend their crypto as effortlessly as they spend fiat in their bank.
Traditionally experts have long agreed that to achieve mainstream adoption, bitcoin and cryptocurrency needs to be easier to use as a form of payment and not just a store of value. The volatility in price, however, has been considered much too unstable and volatile in this regard.
Can you imagine taking payment in bitcoin on one day only to see it drop 20% the next day?
As a result users currently only really trade cryptocurrencies for profit or buy and hold them as a long term store of value. And such a use case is fine but it leaves bitcoin out of the mainstream market, to be used only by real enthusiasts in the technology or experienced traders.
And for bitcoin and the alts to grow – in price and reputation – they really need to be adopted by the masses of society in as many countries as possible.
Well this could be a step in the right direction. Coinbase, based in San Francisco, is one of the most widely used and popular exchanges in the world and currently valued at $8 billion as of six months ago (October 2018). With the launch of their own personal new debit card, users of the exchange will be able to spend their crypto – whether bitcoin, litecoin, ethereum – in almost any location in the world, just as you would a regular Visa debit card.
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The new card has a $6.50 issuance fee, and as you use it to pay with your crypto, it gets immediately converted into fiat so that the merchant gets paid in traditional fiat currency with no need for any crypto adoption on their side.
The card does it all for you.
As a Coinbase account holder you simply choose which cryptocurrency you wish to use from the numerous available on the exchange and you’re good to go. The app will provide you with receipts, transaction summaries and all the accounting or record-keeping you need to keep track of your spending.
This is truly the breakthrough that we have been waiting for as crypto enthusiasts.
Can you imagine the freedom it will provide from the need for any central banks or even government observation. You can buy crypto on the exchange and spend it directly from there without ever having to change it back into fiat or move it back into your traditional bank account at all.
Does this mean Coinbase is becoming like a bank?
It is recommended never to keep all your crypto on any exchange, so you may want to decide how you utilize such a facility.
This is possibly the first debit card of its kind in the world, linking directly to an exchange and allowing you to spend your crypto without moving it anywhere. In the past you may have had other similar debit cards but you had to pre-load a specific amount of crypto onto it, like a top up each time, which slowed down the process.
This current new design from Coinbase is much more streamlined and user-friendly.
The Coinbase debit card is currently available in the UK and there are plans to make it available in the EU in coming months. The rest of the world may have to wait it seems. Apto Payments (aka Shift) is providing the technology for Coinbase after discontinuing its own card and UK payment processor PaySafe is issuing the cards.
By smoothing out and streamlining the way in which we can spend bitcoin and crypto, Coinbase and Visa have really opened up the market and will certainly attract more of the masses, now that the practical daily application of crypto has been made so user-friendly.
It’s little things like this – at the actual user interface – that will really spur adoption and allow bitcoin to become mainstream. And this will only push the price to new ATHs, which is what current traders are waiting for.
It’s just a matter of time.