Some 8,500 consumers in the Chinese city of Shanghai have been given e-wallets containing digital yuan as part of the country’s ongoing pilot scheme for its central bank digital currency (CBDC)... More
Amazon is recruiting a tech team that will be tasked with building “innovative payment products for customers in emerging markets” that will enable “customers to convert their cash into digital currency” to purchase “goods and/or services like Prime Video”, a job advertisement posted by the company reveals... More
Expedited virtual currency transaction system — USPTO — “The systems and methods of the present disclosure practically eliminate the amount of time the payee must wait to be sure they will receive a virtual currency payment in a virtual currency transaction by transferring to the payee private keys that are included in virtual currency wallets that are associated with predefined amounts of virtual currency that equal a payment amount identified in the virtual currency transaction.”
Venezuela unveils virtual currency amid economic crisis — BBC News — “Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has announced the creation of a new virtual currency in a bid to ease the country’s economic crisis. He said the Petro would be backed by Venezuela’s oil, gas, gold and diamond wealth… Mr Maduro said the new cryptocurrency would allow Venezuela ‘to advance in issues of monetary sovereignty, to make financial transactions and overcome the financial blockade.'”
Amazon debuts a new Appstore app with better discovery, focus on Amazon Coins — Techcrunch — “Introduced in 2013, the Amazon Coins platform represents a different means of encouraging consumers to pay for apps and in-app purchases. Instead of seeing a dollar amount associated with their purchase, app developers show the purchase amount as coins… The idea is that the more Coins you purchase, the more you’ll save on the purchase amount. For example, 100 Amazon Coins are worth $100, but when you buy them in larger bundles, they cost less. With the highest package, customers can save up to 22% on their Coin purchases.”
American Express eyes blockchain for customer rewards systems — CoinDesk — “A new patent application published last week by the US Patent and Trademark Office details a concept for offering customer-specific types of rewards (including points, a virtual currency or specific items tied to a product). The filing indicates the financial giant would make these offers by compiling personalized data about the customer, such as their historic spending patterns.”
MUFG seeks to quicken cashless push with card unit buyout — Nikkei — “Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group plans to turn a credit card unit into a wholly owned subsidiary and position it as a hub for new financial services such as virtual currency payment… MUFG’s move is driven by the prospect that cashless payment methods such as digital wallets and virtual currency will proliferate in Japan as financial technologies evolve.”
Bitcoin wallet Coinbase has expanded into Australia... More
The total value of Bitcoin transactions is expected to exceed US$92bn this year, up from less than $27bn in 2015, Juniper Research predicts... More
Bitcoin wallet Coinbase has added support for PayPal and credit cards... More
Canadians can now use the MintChip virtual currency to send and receive money through a P2P mobile app and make payments at participating merchants in Toronto’s Liberty Village neighbourhood by scanning a barcode... More
UK consumers will soon be rewarded whenever they are physically active with Sweatcoin — a virtual currency that can be earned by exercising and then exchanged at select retailers via a mobile app set to launch next week... More
Bitcoin payment gateway BitPay has launched the BitPay Visa Card, a debit card that will let US consumers make payments with the virtual currency wherever Visa is accepted and make ATM withdrawals... More
Bitcoin wallet provider Shake has introduced the first version of its app to let consumers make everyday purchases using the virtual currency with a tap of their NFC device at any contactless terminal... More
American Express is exploring a system that would let its customers use reward points for purchases in third-party digital wallets, according to a newly published patent application... More
Mintchip, the digital currency developed and field tested in an NFC payments pilot by The Royal Canadian Mint, has been acquired by Loyalty Pays Holdings Corporation, a subsidiary of NanoPay... More
Bitcoin wallet Coinbase and Shift Payments have introduced a US-issued Bitcoin-backed debit card that will allow Coinbase users in 24 states to make payments using the virtual currency both online and in-store... More
Bitcoin payment gateway BitPay has announced a new integration with point-of-sale terminal maker Ingenico that will allow consumers to use the virtual currency to make mobile payments at “thousands of retailer terminals worldwide”... More
Seven in ten (71%) US IT operations, security, and electronic deployment professionals consider NFC to be essential or very important to their organization’s security, a survey by Ponemon Institute for HP Atalla has found, with host card emulation (HCE) following closely behind at 68%... More
The Royal Canadian Mint is halting development of its MintChip digital currency and is now looking to sell the business... More
