Visa, Mastercard Pause Partnerships with Crypto, After Industry Melts Down

By Yehudit Garmaise

When crypto was a hot new financial idea, Visa and Mastercard planned to launch “crypto-backed payment cards,” but after the new industry showed signs of melting down, the credit card giants are choosing to indefinitely delay the launches of their new crypto-related products and services.

Although crypto, which is a type of digital currency that travels through computer networks instead of banks or governments, was catching on in late 2021, when Mayor Eric Adams who was trying to increase enthusiasm for crypto by promising to take his first three paychecks in the digital currency, the mayor ended up losing consider chunks of his paychecks as crypto began to crash in 2022.

Investors’ faith in crypto, which was already shaky amidst losses, crumbled after FTX and BlockFi, which were once major players in the crypto industry, both filed for bankruptcy: causing the US government to increase its regulatory scrutiny of the new industry, Reuters reported.

"Recent high-profile failures in the crypto sector are an important reminder that we have a long way to go before crypto becomes a part of mainstream payments and financial services," said a spokesperson for Visa, the world's largest payment processor, which is not abandoning its crypto strategies.

A spokesperson for Mastercard also said that the credit card giant will “continue to focus on the underlying blockchain technology and how that can be applied to help address current pain points and build more efficient systems."

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