Paypal introduces crypto services in the UK

Karthik Subramanian

Paypal has announced that it has launched crypto services through its platform to its millions of users in the UK as the country becomes just the second in the list of countries that Paypal has decided to launch the crypto services in, after the US.

paypal

With this launch, the Paypal users in the UK would be able to buy/sell/transact/transfer/hold cryptocurrencies in their Paypal accounts. Though these services have been launched by the company, it also specifies that the users should read through the risks involved in dealing with cryptos and understand them fully before looking to buy or sell the cryptos and they have also added a lot of educational material surrounding cryptos in the platform for the users to read and get familiarised.

This is a major shot in the arm for the crypto ecosystem as Paypal is one of the biggest payment platforms in the world with over 400 million customers and the fact that they are aggressively pushing crypto users to the mainstream and to users who have not been exposed to cryptos earlier should help to bring in more people into the crypto industry.

The company had introduced the same set of services in the US earlier in the year which allowed users to use the cryptos in their account even for purchases that they made with online merchants.

“We are committed to continuing working closely with regulators in the UK, and around the world, to offer our support— and meaningfully contribute to shaping the role digital currencies will play in the future of global finance and commerce,” Jose Fernandez da Ponte, vice president and general manager for blockchain, crypto, and digital currencies at PayPal, said in a statement.

Paypal has been treading pretty carefully in this industry as the regulations and the laws surrounding this industry are still in the nascent stages and they do not want to rub the regulators the wrong way and get into trouble in the long run, like what Binance has been facing recently. But this adoption of crypto by Paypal should spur other big crypto companies like Coinbase into upping their game to match what Paypal is doing and this competition is likely to benefit the cryptocurrency ecosystem immensely. We had also recently reported that Paypal was augmenting its team in Ireland as it eyes further expansion and growth to other regions with Europe.

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