Visa Makes Move to Closely Integrate Circle’s USD Coin

By Scott Chipolina

Visa today announced a partnership with Circle Internet Financial and will be integrating its dollar-backed stablecoin, US Dollar Coin (USDC), according to Forbes.

Stablecoins have long been considered an effective on-ramp to the wider cryptocurrency world. Visa has now taken a major step in the growth of the stablecoin market, as credit card issuers will be able to send and receive USDC payments. 

Visa will not provide custodial service for the digital currency itself, but rather work with Circle to select credit card issuers that will begin integrating USDC into their platforms. 

Further down the line, it hopes to offer a corporate card that lets its users spend USDC.

“This will be the first, corporate card that will allow businesses to be able to spend a balance of USDC,” said Cuy Sheffield, head of crypto at Visa, adding that, “We think that this will significantly increase the utility that USDC can have for Circle’s business clients.”

Sheffield, who remains optimistic about the use of stablecoins, also said, “Blockchain networks and stablecoins, like USDC are just additional networks. So we think that there’s a significant value that Visa can provide to our clients.” 

Bringing new clients to the crypto industry is often cited as the stablecoin’s primary use case, but USDC’s use cases are reportedly expanding beyond this. In March 2020, USDC was approved as a form of collateral for loans issued by MakerDAO, one of decentralized finance’s most well-known and used protocols. 

So, USDC is not only acting as an entry-point into cryptocurrencies, but it is also helping progress the evolving DeFi industry—an ever-growing subsection of the crypto industry.

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