LONDON (Reuters) - PayPal Holdings Inc joined the cryptocurrency market on Wednesday, allowing customers to buy, sell and hold bitcoin and other virtual coins using the U.S. digital payments company’s online wallets.
PayPal customers will also be able to use cryptocurrencies to shop at the 26 million merchants on its network starting in early 2021, the company said in a statement.
PayPal hopes the service will encourage global use of virtual coins and prepare its network for new digital currencies that may be developed by central banks and corporations, President and Chief Executive Dan Schulman said in an interview.
“We are working with central banks and thinking of all forms of digital currencies and how PayPal can play a role,” he said.
U.S. account holders will be able to buy, sell and hold cryptocurrencies in their PayPal wallets over the coming weeks, the company said. It plans to expand to Venmo and some countries in the first half of 2021.
Other mainstream fintech companies, such as mobile payments provider Square Inc and stock trading app firm Robinhood Markets Inc, allow users to buy and sell cryptocurrencies, but PayPal’s launch is noteworthy given its vast reach.
The company, based in San Jose, California, has 346 million active accounts around the world and processed $222 billion in payments in the second quarter.
Cryptocurrencies tend to be volatile, making them attractive to speculators, but a lot less appealing to merchants and shoppers. Transactions have been slower and more costly than other mainstream payment systems.
Cryptocurrency payments on PayPal will be settled using fiat currencies, such as the U.S. dollar, meaning merchants will not receive payments in virtual coins, the company said.
Many central banks around the world have expressed their intention to develop digital versions of their currencies in the coming years, while Facebook Inc-led the creation of a cryptocurrency project called Libra in 2019. PayPal was a founding member but dropped out after a few months.
PayPal, which has secured the first conditional cryptocurrency license from the New York State Department of Financial Services, will initially allow purchases of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies called ethereum, bitcoin cash and litecoin, it said. It partners with Paxos Trust Company to offer the service.
Source:
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-paypal-cryptocurrency/paypal-to-allow-cryptocurrency-buying-selling-and-shopping-on-its-network-idUSKBN2761L6I think you're mistaken.
If you want something that signs messages in general use GPG. It would be an extremely bad practice to come up with some novel cryptosystem just to sign messages when established audited and mature alternatives exists.
[2018-07-31]BTC Plunges Below $8k Amid Unexpected Sell-Off On the Last Day of Ju
July 31, 2018, 04:57:44 PM
Reply with quote #1
Bitcoin Plunges Below $8k Amid Unexpected Sell-Off on the Last Day of July
NYT Columnist Paul Krugman Tries to Justify his Skepticism Towards Cryptocurrencies, Claims Bitcoin Represents a 300-year economic regression
Bitcoin uses a novel cryptosystem for signing transactions called Bitcoin Script which allows all sorts of complex constraints on the signatures. It's why with Bitcoin you can do multisig-- but for GPG and whatnot, you can't really (technically it could be done, but would need complex MPC crypto which no one implements).
Sometimes you want to sign messages with bitcoin addresses, e.g. to have the operator of an address attest to something.
If you're going to do that and support all addresses, then you need to use Bitcoin script to do it. In doing so, you pick up some of the structure that goes around script-- some of which may not be as useful outside of the blockchain.
So I don't think anyone particularly wants to use the bitcoin core code base-- but rather they want a signmessage that works for all Bitcoin addresses.
Quote from: tiagocs on July 11, 2020, 07:45:44 PM
1 - Why was it chosen to prepend the scriptPubKey (when not P2PKH) to the preimage? To me, this adds unnecessary complexity which will slow down the adoption of BIP 322 by bitcoin libraries.
I'm not sure, but I could speculate:
Because that's how signing works in Bitcoin so it should make it simpler for existing code. Also signatures generally must commit to their public keys or weird vulnerabilities crop up where you think you're signing with one key, but you're really signing for a related key.
Bitcoin uses a novel cryptosystem for signing transactions called Bitcoin Script which allows all sorts of complex constraints on the signatures.
each implementation of bitcoin should have a way of producing and verifying ECDSA signatures and work with scripts to some extent (usually standard ones only) but they don't have to have the flags used in bitcoin core specially when it comes to message verification. for example none of these exist in SPV clients such as Electrum so their code has to significantly change if they wanted to implement this I.P.:
Verifying
Verify a proof, given a standard flags value, a script sig, an optional witness, and a derived sighash as described above.
1. Verify Script with flags=consensus flags (currently P2SH, DERSIG, NULLDUMMY, CLTV, CSV, WITNESS), scriptSig=script sig, scriptPubKey=scriptPubKey, witness=witness, and sighash=sighash
3. Verify Script with flags=standard flags (above plus STRICTENC, MINIMALDATA, etc.), scriptSig=script sig, scriptPubKey=scriptPubKey, witness=witness, and sighash=sighash
also these flags are used during block verification and most of them are there for backward compatibility (eg. whether BIP-66 is enabled to use DERSIG or BIP-112 for OP_CSV), i don't see why they should be used in a message signature verification.
not to mention that certain things from bitcoin scripts can not even be imported into message verification. some are addressing malleability issues, some OP codes such as those involving locktimes cause a lot of problems as there is no transaction or block to use for verification, the "signature" that is popped from the stack in transaction during script evaluation has a sighash flag which makes no sense in a message since there is no txout/ins to sign based on that,...
Quote from: gmaxwell on July 12, 2020, 05:57:52 AM
So I don't think anyone particularly wants to use the bitcoin core code base-- but rather they want a signmessage that works for all Bitcoin addresses.
then the proposal could have been a lot simpler or even expand on BIP-137 instead.
for instance as i said above there is no reason to use "witness" in a message signature from a bitcoin address since we are not producing a transaction and backward compatibility of SegWit is not needed here.
take P2PKH and P2WPKH, both of them are the exact same thing there is a pubkey that is hashed using HASH160 and there is a signature that matches that pubkey. in a transaction it makes a difference when creating the hash digest for verification and where the "stack items" are placed, but it is the same when verifying a message.
same with P2SH and P2WSH.
each implementation of bitcoin should have a way of producing and verifying ECDSA signatures and work with scripts to some extent (usually standard ones only) but they don't have to have the flags used in bitcoin core specially when it comes to message verification. for example none of these exist in SPV clients such as Electrum so their code has to significantly change if they wanted to implement this I.P.:
SPV clients don't verify transactions-- they can't because they don't have access to scriptpubkeys. This means that I wouldn't expect SPV clients to already contain the relevant code.
Quote
also these flags are used during block verification and most of them are there for backward compatibility (eg. whether BIP-66 is enabled to use DERSIG or BIP-112 for OP_CSV), i don't see why they should be used in a message signature verification.
Yucky for the spec to be described in terms of those flags which are presumably not adequately documented.
But the behaviour they signify has to be handled correctly to use generic Bitcoin addresses to process messages.
not to mention that certain things from bitcoin scripts can not even be imported into message verification. some are addressing malleability issues, some OP codes such as those involving locktimes cause a lot of problems as there is no transaction or block to use for verification, the "signature" that is popped from the stack in transaction during script evaluation has a sighash flag which makes no sense in a message since there is no txout/ins to sign based on that,...
The strategy there should be to operate with a dummy, and the spec should be describing it that way.
take P2PKH and P2WPKH, both of them are the exact same thing there is a pubkey that is hashed using HASH160 and there is a signature that matches that pubkey. in a transaction it makes a difference when creating the hash digest for verification and where the "stack items" are placed, but it is the same when verifying a message.
same with P2SH and P2WSH.
That sounds like just falling into the same trap of only supporting an absurdly narrow subset of keys users use which then stands in the way of new use cases. I think that's just a total waste of time, and actually harmful for the industry.
For example, there have been users that refused to change to multisig-- when they could have otherwise used it, because they couldn't signmessage with it and they'd adopted some workflow that required them to signmessage with their addresses. The old signmessage format has turned out to be a boat anchor that has actually slow the adoption of new techniques and better security in Bitcoin. In hindsight, I think we made a mistake in ever implementing it in the first place.
There is certainly a place in the world for message signing systems that are simpler and less -- well-- weird than Bitcoin script but for those you should use something like PGP or signify.
And I don't intend to defend the BIP322 specifics -- only the general motivation of using script so that you can sign with arbitrary addresses.
It's not done that way because the authors wanted to use some bitcoin core internals, it's that way because its intended to be a generic mechanism that works for _every_ address, unconditionally, even ones that aren't widely in use right now-- and can be easily extended as bitcoin's consensus rules are. The easiest way to do that is to use a bunch of bitcoin internals, but it sounds like it's currently resulting in an unclear spec. -- apparently unclear enough that it didn't make its motivation and justifications clear enough.
Inherently though, anything generic is going to be more work to support for something that doesn't actually support verifying bitcoin signatures. There really isn't any way around that-- but fortunately no one is required to implement it!
tiagocs, pooya87, I think it's important that BIP322 work with arbitrary scripts, for the reasons that gmax has stated. But I also agree that BIP322 is written currently to require very heavy machinery (basically, linking to libbitcoinconsensus to do absolutely anything, and goes out of its way to expose sharp edges of Script. For example, allowing non-low-S signatures and then requiring verifiers to mark this as "inconclusive" appears to serve no purpose.
I wonder if you would support a version of BIP322 which:
1. Required all standardness rules be obeyed (and allowed as an "extension" to validate such signatures, somewhere cordoned off at the end of the BIP where
2. Specified what these standardness rules were/meant
3. Allowed implementations to return "inconclusive" for scripts they did not understand, while still permitting them to implement only templates if they really
The first two rules would let you use off-the-shelf Minscript software (such as this implementation in Python to support all widely used scripts except HTLCs, so even if you did not write a full BIP-322 verifier (which would require libbitcoinconsensus or Core) you would still be able to support a wide array of real-world usecases.
Short term speaking it's impossible to figure out, but we have enough empirical evidence that the price always favors the long term, and based on that you can long the market without any problems. If people did just that instead of blindly betting against the short term market they would be a whole lot wealthier right now. It even applies to stocks -- if you open a long term long position you are pretty much guaranteed to see the value go up. It doesn't require people to be a rocket scientist, ask Warren Buffett, it's his favorite way of investing. He's also not shy of using a very low leverage multiplier to generate even higher gains....
http://www.johnshillidays.co.uk/pbg/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto04.htmlhttp://www.johnshillidays.co.uk/pbg/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto03.htmlhttp://www.johnshillidays.co.uk/pbg/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto02.htmlhttp://www.johnshillidays.co.uk/pbg/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto01.htmlhttp://dci-dsa.com/fub/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto04.htmlhttp://dci-dsa.com/fub/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto03.htmlhttp://dci-dsa.com/fub/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto02.htmlhttp://dci-dsa.com/fub/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto01.htmlhttps://igps.ru/pol/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto04.htmlhttps://igps.ru/pol/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto03.htmlhttps://igps.ru/pol/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto02.htmlhttps://igps.ru/pol/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto01.htmlhttps://www.cbre-ea.com/edr/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto04.htmlhttps://www.cbre-ea.com/edr/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto03.htmlhttps://www.cbre-ea.com/edr/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto02.htmlhttps://www.cbre-ea.com/edr/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto01.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/ygh/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto04.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/ygh/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto03.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/ygh/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto02.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/ygh/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto01.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/tug/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto04.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/tug/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto03.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/tug/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto02.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/tug/Colo-v-Catlica-drcto01.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/bana/Colo-v-Catl-En-Tv8.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/bana/Colo-v-Catl-En-Tv7.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/bana/Colo-v-Catl-En-Tv6.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/bana/Colo-v-Catl-En-Tv5.htmlhttps://www.cbre-ea.com/coclo/Colo-v-Catl-En-Tv8.htmlhttps://www.cbre-ea.com/coclo/Colo-v-Catl-En-Tv7.htmlhttps://www.cbre-ea.com/coclo/Colo-v-Catl-En-Tv6.htmlhttps://www.cbre-ea.com/coclo/Colo-v-Catl-En-Tv5.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-Parm-Juve.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-Parm-Juve-tv.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-Parm-Juve-bh.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-Parm-Juve-bi.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-Parm-Juve-bi-tv.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-P-J-Roja-tv.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-P-J-Roja-jp.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-P-J-Roja-asd.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-P-J-Roja-xzs.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-Roja-P-J.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-Roja-P-J-tv.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-Roja-P-J-jg.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-Roja-P-J-jf.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-Roja-P-J-it.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-Dove-P-J-it.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-P-J-it-hr.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-P-J-it-so.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-P-J-it-son.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-P-J-it-bigo.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-P-J-it-bi.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-P-J-it-bc.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-P-J-it-bqw.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-P-J-it-gw.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Diretta-P-J-it-fr.htmlhttps://aires.com/ava/ColoColo-Catlica-ver74.htmlhttps://aires.com/ava/ColoColo-Catlica-Onli.htmlhttps://aires.com/ava/Catlica-25li.htmlhttps://aires.com/ava/Catlica-8li.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/ColoColo-Catlica-ver74.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/ColoColo-Catlica-Onli.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Catlica-25li.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Catlica-8li.htmlhttps://www.cbre-ea.com/ecl/ColoColo-Catlica-ver74.htmlhttps://www.cbre-ea.com/ecl/ColoColo-Catlica-Onli.htmlhttps://www.cbre-ea.com/ecl/Catlica-25li.htmlhttps://www.cbre-ea.com/ecl/Catlica-8li.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tdo-Glory-76.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tdo-Glory-76-01.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tdo-Glory-76-02.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tin-Glory-76.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tin-Glory-76-01.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tin-Glory-76-022.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tin-Glory-76-023.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tpc-Glory-76-1.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tpc-Glory-76-2.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/y-canales-en-directo2.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/y-canales-en-directo1.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/y-canales-en-directo.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tpc-Glory-76-3.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tpc-Glory-76-4.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tpc-Glory-76-5.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tpc-Glory-76-6.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tpc-Glory-76-7.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tpc-Glory-76-8.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tpc-Glory-76-9.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tpc-Glory-76-10.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/sex/tpc-Glory-76-11.htmlhttp://www.johnshillidays.co.uk/pbg/Colo-el-clasico04.htmlhttp://www.johnshillidays.co.uk/pbg/Colo-el-clasico03.htmlhttp://www.johnshillidays.co.uk/pbg/Colo-el-clasico02.htmlhttp://www.johnshillidays.co.uk/pbg/Colo-el-clasico01.htmlhttp://dci-dsa.com/fub/Colo-el-clasico04.htmlhttp://dci-dsa.com/fub/Colo-el-clasico03.htmlhttp://dci-dsa.com/fub/Colo-el-clasico02.htmlhttp://dci-dsa.com/fub/Colo-el-clasico01.htmlhttps://igps.ru/pol/Colo-el-clasico04.htmlhttps://igps.ru/pol/Colo-el-clasico03.htmlhttps://igps.ru/pol/Colo-el-clasico02.htmlhttps://igps.ru/pol/Colo-el-clasico01.htmlhttps://www.cbre-ea.com/edr/Colo-el-clasico04.htmlhttps://www.cbre-ea.com/edr/Colo-el-clasico03.htmlhttps://www.cbre-ea.com/edr/Colo-el-clasico02.htmlhttps://www.cbre-ea.com/edr/Colo-el-clasico01.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/ygh/Colo-el-clasico04.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/ygh/Colo-el-clasico03.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/ygh/Colo-el-clasico02.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/ygh/Colo-el-clasico01.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/tug/Colo-el-clasico04.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/tug/Colo-el-clasico03.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/tug/Colo-el-clasico02.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/tug/Colo-el-clasico01.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/bana/cane-v-amth-hq1.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/bana/cane-v-amth-hq2.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/bana/cane-v-amth-hq3.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/bana/cane-v-amth-hq4.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/bana/cane-v-amth-hq5.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/hoko/cane-v-amth-hq1.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/hoko/cane-v-amth-hq2.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/hoko/cane-v-amth-hq3.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/hoko/cane-v-amth-hq4.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/hoko/cane-v-amth-hq5.htmlhttps://igps.ru/dkr/cane-v-amth-hq1.htmlhttps://igps.ru/dkr/cane-v-amth-hq2.htmlhttps://igps.ru/dkr/cane-v-amth-hq3.htmlhttps://igps.ru/dkr/cane-v-amth-hq4.htmlhttps://igps.ru/dkr/cane-v-amth-hq5.htmlhttp://dci-dsa.com/fub/cane-v-amth-hq1.htmlhttp://dci-dsa.com/fub/cane-v-amth-hq2.htmlhttp://dci-dsa.com/fub/cane-v-amth-hq3.htmlhttp://dci-dsa.com/fub/cane-v-amth-hq4.htmlhttp://dci-dsa.com/fub/cane-v-amth-hq5.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Video-s-ba-vs-be-tcx2.htmlhttps://et.water.ca.gov/wev/Video-s-ba-vs-be-tva1.htmlhttps://igps.ru/vrvtv/Video-s-ba-vs-be-tcx2.htmlhttps://igps.ru/vrvtv/Video-s-ba-vs-be-tva1.htmlhttps://aires.com/ava/CL-Catlica-8li.htmlhttps://aires.com/ava/Directo-Catlica-85.htmlhttps://aires.com/ava/Directo-Catlica-clcl.htmlhttps://aires.com/ava/Directo-Catlica-qwava.htmlhttps://igps.ru/tuy/video-cle-v-not-cvs-tv06.htmlhttps://cimis.water.ca.gov/bum/video-cle-v-not-cvs-tv06.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/tiktiok/video-cle-v-not-cvs-tv06.htmlhttps://igps.ru/tuy/video-cle-v-not-cvs-tv06.6.htmlhttps://cimis.water.ca.gov/bum/video-cle-v-not-cvs-tv06.6.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/tiktiok/video-cle-v-not-cvs-tv06.6.htmlhttps://igps.ru/tuy/video-cle-v-not-cvs-tv06.7.htmlhttps://cimis.water.ca.gov/bum/video-cle-v-not-cvs-tv06.7.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/tiktiok/video-cle-v-not-cvs-tv06.7.htmlhttps://igps.ru/tuy/copy-videos-ACC-v-Cham2.htmlhttps://cimis.water.ca.gov/bum/copy-videos-ACC-v-Cham2.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/tiktiok/copy-videos-ACC-v-Cham2.htmlhttps://igps.ru/tuy/copy-videos-ACC-v-Cham2.2.htmlhttps://cimis.water.ca.gov/bum/copy-videos-ACC-v-Cham2.2.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/tiktiok/copy-videos-ACC-v-Cham2.2.htmlhttps://igps.ru/tuy/copy-videos-ACC-v-Cham2.3.htmlhttps://cimis.water.ca.gov/bum/copy-videos-ACC-v-Cham2.3.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/tiktiok/copy-videos-ACC-v-Cham2.3.htmlhttps://igps.ru/tuy/copy-videos-ACC-v-Cham2.4.htmlhttps://cimis.water.ca.gov/bum/copy-videos-ACC-v-Cham2.4.htmlhttp://www.wellspring.edu.lb/tiktiok/copy-videos-ACC-v-Cham2.4.htmlRe: [2018-07-31]BTC Plunges Below $8k Amid Unexpected Sell-Off On the Last Day of Ju
Reply with quote #9
Quote from: SlipMart on July 31, 2018, 04:57:44 PM
Bitcoin Plunges Below $8k...
https://aires.com/ava/Directo-Catlica-Vivova.htmlhttps://aires.com/ava/Directo-Catlica-Vcolva.htmlhttps://aires.com/ava/ecto-Catlica-Vcolva.htmlas usual whenever the price falls a lot we have all news channels talking about bitcoin. in a few weeks we will have more news with titles of how bitcoin is just falling, when we will see the bottom, we found the bottom, will fall down of $ 5000. and if prices increase then we will have many analysts saying that the price will reach $ 40,000, other more daring analysts will say that the price will rise to $250,000. and the argument is input of institutional investors. This has already become a very predictable novel
LONDON (Reuters) - PayPal Holdings Inc joined the cryptocurrency market on Wednesday, allowing customers to buy, sell and hold bitcoin and other virtual coins using the U.S. digital payments company’s online wallets.
PayPal customers will also be able to use cryptocurrencies to shop at the 26 million merchants on its network starting in early 2021, the company said in a statement.
PayPal hopes the service will encourage global use of virtual coins and prepare its network for new digital currencies that may be developed by central banks and corporations, President and Chief Executive Dan Schulman said in an interview.
“We are working with central banks and thinking of all forms of digital currencies and how PayPal can play a role,” he said.
U.S. account holders will be able to buy, sell and hold cryptocurrencies in their PayPal wallets over the coming weeks, the company said. It plans to expand to Venmo and some countries in the first half of 2021.
Other mainstream fintech companies, such as mobile payments provider Square Inc and stock trading app firm Robinhood Markets Inc, allow users to buy and sell cryptocurrencies, but PayPal’s launch is noteworthy given its vast reach.
The company, based in San Jose, California, has 346 million active accounts around the world and processed $222 billion in payments in the second quarter.
Cryptocurrencies tend to be volatile, making them attractive to speculators, but a lot less appealing to merchants and shoppers. Transactions have been slower and more costly than other mainstream payment systems.
Cryptocurrency payments on PayPal will be settled using fiat currencies, such as the U.S. dollar, meaning merchants will not receive payments in virtual coins, the company said.
Many central banks around the world have expressed their intention to develop digital versions of their currencies in the coming years, while Facebook Inc-led the creation of a cryptocurrency project called Libra in 2019. PayPal was a founding member but dropped out after a few months.
PayPal, which has secured the first conditional cryptocurrency license from the New York State Department of Financial Services, will initially allow purchases of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies called ethereum, bitcoin cash and litecoin, it said. It partners with Paxos Trust Company to offer the service.