Starting from March 30, 2021, US PayPal users will now be able to pay for goods and services directly with cryptocurrencies via the new “Checkout with Crypto” feature.
With Checkout with Crypto, users will be able to instantly convert Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin, or Bitcoin Cash into US dollars, without any additional fees, which will be used for the settlement of the transaction. It is estimated that it will be possible to pay with cryptocurrencies in more than 29 million businesses in the coming months.
If a merchant does not accept US dollars, Paypal will be responsible for the conversion into local currency according to the rates in effect.
Since the end of last year, PayPal has decided to open up to cryptocurrencies, seeing evidently interesting business opportunities in the world of digital coins.
The president of PayPal, Dan Schulman, showed on video a first purchase with this system. “This is the first time you can seamlessly use cryptocurrencies in the same way as a credit card or a debit card inside your PayPal wallet,” says Dan Schulman to Reuters.
The feature will automatically appear in a user’s PayPal wallet who has sufficient cryptocurrency funds to cover a purchase. Only one type of cryptocurrency can be used for each purchase, which means that a single transaction cannot be covered by the sum of multiple cryptocurrencies at the same time.
PayPal only allows you to pay with cryptocurrencies that have been previously purchased through its platform. In other words, external wallets cannot be used. According to the company, this decision is mainly due to providing transparency in operations.
