PayPal expands cryptocurrency offerings to US business accounts

PAYPAL Holdings will now permit merchants to buy, hold and sell cryptocurrency from their business accounts, expanding on the payments firm’s already-available consumer offerings.

PayPal has allowed consumers to buy, hold and sell digital crypto via their PayPal and Venmo accounts since 2020, and then further committed to digital currency with the launch of its US dollar-denominated stablecoin, PayPal USD, last year. The San Jose, California-based firm has since learned more about how people want to use their crypto, according to Jose Fernandez da Ponte, PayPal’s senior vice-president of blockchain, cryptocurrency and digital currencies.

“Business owners have increasingly expressed a desire for the same cryptocurrency capabilities available to consumers,” he said on Wednesday (Sep 25).

Merchants have had many options for accepting crypto, such as BitPay, along with the ability to accept payments from services such as Coinbase Commerce.

PayPal’s merchant functionality will not be available in New York at launch, the firm said. Businesses will be allowed to transfer the digital currency to third-party eligible wallets and send and receive supported tokens to and from external blockchain addresses, according to the statement. BLOOMBERG