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CoverStory

Crypto has taken several forms in the payments space. Some legacy payments companies are forging partnerships
There are crypto-backed credit and debit cards. "This is with crypto companies to support similar arrangements
the most similar to traditional card payments," Wubbels where merchants accept crypto on the front end for
said. settlement in dollars. The solutions eliminate volatility
risk by instantly converting crypto to dollars as soon as
Both Visa and Mastercard support crypto card issuance. payment is initiated.
Visa reported in 2021 that it was working with 50 cryp-
to platforms, and that while penetration is low—only 10 Verifone partnered with BitPay to support cryptocurrency
percent of cryptocurrency owners report having crypto- acceptance by merchants using one of the company's
linked cards—"the issuance of crypto-linked cards pres- Engage devices or an Android phone connected to Verifone
ents an opportunity to start participating in crypto." cloud services. Customers initiate payments using digital
wallets to scan on-screen QR codes. Customers can choose
It's what Brown describes as FOMO (fear of missing out). from any one of 15 cryptocurrencies, and more will be
"Crypto has a lot of FOMO," he said. "That's what's going added, Belostock said. The official rollout is planned for
to drive us into it." spring, he noted.

Payments upstart, New York-based Flexa, uses blockchain "What merchants are really interested in is letting
rather than the card network rails to settle purely digital consumers pay them however they want to pay," Belostock
payments. Flexa offers an app that integrates with existing said, adding that crypto is just another new payment
POS systems and digital wallets. option, like buy now pay later and mobile P2P payment
apps.
The app generates unique barcodes (flexcodes) participat-
ing merchants scan to authorize and guarantee payments. Patti Murphy is senior editor at The Green Sheet and self-described
Flexa then pays merchants their choice of crypto or fiat payments maven of the fourth estate. Follow her on Twitter @GS_
money, and deducts equivalent amounts of crypto from
customers' digital wallets. "On the Flexa crypto network, PayMaven.
payments are made quickly, securely and with the lowest
fees," wrote Tyler Spalding, co-founder and CEO.

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