Bitcoin Forum

Hello,
I'm here to explore the demand for crypto debit card.

The basics behind it is actually very simple:
1. You own some crypto funds on your account on an exchange (crypto/FIAT markets) that has partnered with a debit card provider. You'd have to identify yourself (pass KYC).
2. You get the card. It is a basic mastercard  debit card for FIAT payments. No magic.
3. When you use it, it automatically exchanges your crypto to FIAT based on the amount you're spending. You would even be able prioritize the order in which your crypto is to be exchanged the first, the second, etc.

So, would you use one? 
If yes, would such service motivate you enough to open an account on the exchange that is not (yet) one of the TOP ones?

Disclaimer: I'm a business owner in a position to offer such service. Knowing your opinion would help me a lot. So, thanks in advance!

There's a lot of demand for this and there are already people trying to offer this. I personally know of Monaco and Wirex but there are also many others. So the demand is there for sure.

You'll need something that distinguishes you from all of the others.

This will be a good news and I know that cryptocurrency fans will happily embrace this development. For this to be successful there are some infrastructures needed, one of the most important of them all is ATM that will dispense the fiat.

I'll consider first knowing about the fees. This is everyones concern why we are here. Transferring bitcoin to anotger person isnt expensive so if the fees are competitive and reasonable the Ill try to use one as trial.

It will also depend on the agreement of the card provider, if its very fair and reasonable too then count me in. Id love to spend cryptos for fiat and real world transactions.

No,I wouldn't use one.It's pointless.All the crypto-to-fiat conversions for nothing.
I would rather use a crypto debit card for crypto payments and a fiat debit card for fiat payments.
I don't mind the KYC policies,by the way... ;D

It makes no sense to me to use a crypto related debit card to spend fiat the same way I can spend fiat already with my legacy debit card. I rather convert the coins to fiat myself and then spend them whenever I want.

I might sound a bit like I don't see much utility here, but it doesn't solve a problem because you are still spending fiat and not crypto. You basically put a jacket over something that already works well.

I rather see more merchant adoption accepting crypto currencies for what they are, and not advertise something that has no meaning here. Crypto is here to improve the way we conduct peer to peer payments, not support fiat.

This was done by a local exchange some time in 2014-2016 until Wavecrest holdings (which the exchange gets it prepaid cards from) suspended its operations dealing with cryptocurrencies and exchanges. I'd use one if possible, though I have to put a certain amount of trust to the facilitator if ever, which is a compromise I'd gladly take if I can use crypto for something else. The number of merchants is not increasing and I see that debit cards are a way to go if people want to spend their crypto for something.

Bittrex, bitstamp, bitfinex and etc, they aren't in top but are well known for people so being in top 10 or in top 50 doesn't matter if you'll offer so good service. What you described is similar of Xapo. Also you know bitcoin ATMs charge so high fees... If we will be available to withdraw from every atm worldwide with very low fees like 1% or fixed 2.5 euro or 10$ monthly, something like this, will be amazing.

I think the KYC requirement is a given if you want your card to even be connected to mastercard, this payment service company won't even allow you hooking up unknown parties to use their services.

Of course my main concern is why would a not so popular exchange do this? Questions and suspicions will always arise on these kinds of unique features especially on a not so trusted crypto exchanges. Questions like are they really doing this for our convenience or they really just want our personal information badly and using this KYC requirement to obtain it?  This is really not a question of  anyone wanting it because I know a lot of people do but it should be a question about do we trust this exchange offering this feature in the first place?

Crypto debit card is a great idea, it will increase adoption significantly. At the same time, it will bring a lot more attention and requirements to exchanges: they will become number one target (even more then now) for hackers.

I would not only use it, but I can no longer wait for such cards to appear. As far as I know, at least 5 ICO projects are already working on this idea. And I believe that the crypto community will support this idea. The main thing is that the implementation of this idea was successful. The debit card should have instant conversion, low conversion fees and a favorable internal conversion rate. If all goes well, it seems to me that these cards will have a stunning success. The problem is that regulators in many countries have not yet developed a legislative framework for interaction with cryptocurrencies, and therefore many projects have difficulty in implementing this idea.

I would never use this kind of thing. This is the same idea like Ripple. We do NOT need fiat, Bitcoin was created against fiat. Personally, I would like more cryptocurrencies instead of fiat worthless paper money. I do hold for a long period though.

This kind of service is already old.
Go find a new feature.
Something which doesnt require to do this and that and so on and forth.
Make it as user friendly as it is. Crypto currencies are already hard to understand for most of the people and we dont want it to be more difficult for them.

Why use a debit card for crypto currencies when you can do it with fiat using banks? Makes no sense right?

Maybe a product from crypto to cryptp so that we could trash that fiat system already.

Man, this idea has been a thing since just about as long as Bitcoin has been a thing.
At one point, I was actually looking to implement this.

TBH, It's a good idea, but a very hard one to execute correctly. So many companies have come, tried, and failed (to be fair: I'm sure there are some successes).

If you can find a way to make this adoption simple & sweet, and available to many different countries, than the company may have a shot. The main issue has been adoption & difficulty getting/using a card.

Basically, the infrastructure on both ends is already there. We're just putting the bridge in between.

Those would probably be a bit larger than a taker fee and in some cases less than withdrawing FIAT from an exchange to an IBAN that has a card.

That's totally find. For me both of you are the kind of user that is probably not my target group. My target group earns/get lots of crypto (basically most or all of one's earnings are probably from crypto; like a miner or full time trader) and I'm offering then a headache-free gateway to get oneself a cup of coffee at Starbucks.

To attract you customer. A the little ones have to put more effort to get them.

That is exactly thepoint! That is what we do: we eliminate 2 steps from spending your crypto in the real world (exchanging and withdrawing to FIAT account). There are projects like Lympo that give tokens to users that mostly have no clue about the crypto and what we want to do is give them a card and say: "don't worry about the crypto thing, here's a card, just go and buy something" :)

Most of the countries nowadays require that KYC. Even in my country in SouthEast Asia, they require that in an online Bitcoin Wallet they offer.

Even a blockchain project in Singapore which offers the debit card fiat services require it.

There are several crypto card payments projects in the spce that promised the kind of services you listed above but to my surprise most have failed to keep their promised, some even end up a scamming investors. I have not seen any of this card payment projects filling their promises because they will always be at the mercies of VIsa and Mastercard

I believe that such a card is a very necessary thing for a cryptocurrency market. Such a card could replace many exchangers, which are now very popular. But using the card would be much more convenient. I would use it.

I would say, your business would work temporarily and not feasible in the long run (assuming crypto currencies become mainstream). Why would people want to use debit card which spends their crypto currencies to make payments? What is would be the difference between traditional debitcard and crypto currency based debit card? Moreover, would this destroy the main purpose of using crypto currencies (i am talking about centralization)?

Yup, I've been saying the same thing ever since I discovered bitcoin, which I've always viewed as an investment and not a currency (even though I've used it to buy things from merchants when I'm out of fiat). 

On the old JREF forum, they used to say that bitcoin is a solution in search of a problem that doesn't exist.  I don't view it in such an extreme way, but the fact is that businesses don't want bitcoin, they want fiat.  When you buy something with bitcoin using a payment processor, they're just converting the bitcoin to fiat--and that's what the merchant gets.

I get my paycheck in fiat and tend to always have more fiat than I do crypto, so I would have no use for a crypto debit card, nor would I want to go through a KYC process with a company that I didn't trust.  I already let my bank do that, and that's bad enough.

I'll answer that question using myself as an example:

I have account in my country banks, but my country's banks only allow people to deposit money into their accounts if people give income statements... as bitcoin is not legalized in my country so I can not deliver the income statements that proves the provenance of my funds. I can use paypal to withdraw my money for my bank account, but I can not withdraw more than  $1000 from paypal to my bank account.

So with mastercard card i solve my problem. That's why this idea of @OP is very good.

This is definitely a good idea but they're some companies doing this which I would rather advice you come up with something unique and distinguishable among others. Likewise the fact that cryptocurrency hasn't been accepted world wide I think this would be another issue.

We know that there is no positive side about identity. In cryptocurrency world there is no need for such a thing. But such things cause interest in humans because this is the technology of today. It is not possible to use BTC to shop at the store today and the presence of cards is better than time consuming exchanges.

Its actually quite a good idea, it seems like the card could make the transactions become easier and it will be more efficient, but to make it happened you will need the government permit, and one of the part that I don't like is the kyc part, the main idea of crypto is to stay anonymous, if we keep on compromise one day crypto will become like fiat

Then I will use both, depending on the advantages and what promos will be given, as long as there are not many
crypto debit cards accepted then of course I will use fiat payments first. just use it flexibly

When we are converting crypto every time then this may results in the increase of fee because withdrawal fee on the exchange is high so it won't be suitable for every transaction otherwise I am not against KYC or using crypto cards anywhere.

I have a debit card that I can load with crypto anytime I want and use and it is not a really good one I am afraid. I am using coinsbanks card and they required too many things from me to be able to use it and even though I gave away too much information that I wasn't really thrilled about they are still charging a lot of money for me to spend it as well.

If I want to withdraw cash, I am paying them a lot of money and they have the information on who withdrew the amount, if I want to spend money they charge me a lot and have information who bought what with it. Basically a way to charge me for giving them all the info they can dream of. It is not a great system and I would prefer not to do it this way. Maybe less charges and less information would have been better.

There will probably demand for such service but I am not one of those that will use it because I am not really in any hurry to use my bitcoin to buy stuff, I am going to wait until bitcoin becomes adopted in my country and I know that process will take a long time since I have yet to see a person or a business that uses bitcoin for anything but I have no problems waiting a long time.

It seems difficult also if there is a crypto debit for payments with fiat the problem is that only a small number of companies are able to have cryptosystems, many of which are payments with fiat. Maybe if all can receive crypto automatically the crypto debit card can be used for fiat payments.
And if that happens I will also use a crypto debit card.

I  prefer to have wallet with both fiat and crypto and easyy exchange between currencies
I am afraid that kind of cards use will be expensive
But i have been reading that Samsung will release phone with wallet app what wll support crypto
I don't know details but i imagine that phone will work like that kind of cards

Crypto card for me is not a good type of investment project nor to be bought. A lot of cryptorrency card project that I already joined but I failed to gain profits with their ICO. Most of it are scam or a failed project. So, I already doubt regarding to a debit card transforming into crypto debit card. I want to use only digital wallet because I already proof that it is a good way to transact cryptocurrency.

But, I guess revolutions moved past the debit card issue as well, we now have ability to pay with our mobile phones.
Even on the verges of civilization people have smart phones that can download apps and can be used to pay for something.

You can use your phone app to withdraw cash from atm, you can use it to pay for taxi cab, you can use it to buy groceries, you can buy on cafe. Basically apps are now the new debit cards, credit card is still an issue but at least for debit now there are apps for it.

Hence, if any company wants to create a crypto debit card they are following the trends a bit behind and instead they should be focusing on getting an app made that will allow us to use our phones to pay with crypto while the receiver will take it as fiat instead of crypto, basically be a middleman.

This crypto and fiat can join and become one payment but you have to know that it requires a lot of development and it is very difficult because not everyone knows about cryptocurerncy.

To those who demand for a 100% crypto card and payments - tmm, this is still the distant future. It will come, but not tomorrow. If your income is not mostly based on crypto, good, you can wait. But there are a few (not a majority), that earn from crypto or simply want to spend it now. Now... So, crypto debit card (which is actually a FIAT card) enables you to freely spend your crypto as FIAT. It is convenient and shortens "the sell crypto for fiat -> withdraw fiat to your fiat bank -> use_it" to just hassle-free "use_it" part.

We believe you may be interested is such solution now, if:
a) your bank does not accept FIAT withdrawals from your exchange.
b) you need a convenient hassle-free way to simply buy stuff in the FIAT world.
c) you have no clue about the crypto "thing", but you happen to own some (eg: check Lympo project).
d) you want to evade taxes. We do not encourage that, but such use case exists.

For those who want anonymity - forget the fiat then. Or sell your crypto in cash face-to-face. KYC/AML are the things to be more and more strict in the close future. Just.

 

When I use my bank account, I have at least some level of government protection and reassurance that my bank won't vanish overnight, although I still try not to have more money there than I can afford to lose. But it's worse with these crypto debit cards, because crypto companies exit scam way more often than traditional payment companies and banks. So why should I use them if my current card works well enough?

frankly, I'm not interested in making crypto debit cards because they have to be KYC, that's troublesome, because I haven't created my identity document. but if I already have documents, maybe I will make it.

if to open an exchange that has not yet entered from TOP, maybe I will be vigilant because there are many scam exchanges.

In my opinion, this could be nice in a way, it automatically turn your fiat to cryptocurrency, no need to go to a trading site or app to convert your fiat to cryptocurrency. one good thing that bothers me is the fact that cryptocurrencies are highly volatile, which means that if I borrowed an amount of coin and the market went down, then I would have to pay it in a much higher price, but it is a good thing if the market goes green though.

actually the concept is good and I'm sure there are many people who think about this concept, back again to the shortcomings where the crypto value is fluctuating and later certainly many people will complain about this especially the market does not support this concept.

There are thousands and even countless existing payment methods. there are many vendors making new wallets for payment methods. the point is feud and rivalry in payment methods not only crypto debit cards and fiat debit cards but there are still many others ?

 That's good project but it is not yet available globally. Often time people hold on to their token or price coin instead of using it for simple transaction. Availability of your supposed project would be a main problem for all crypto holder. Good luck on your project.

usually debit cards have limitations in making transactions, so I am not interested in using them
interested friends here might consider the features and services that will be obtained, and of course the differences using FIAT-based crypto vs debitcard-based debit cards

I think STK has a partnership with mastercard.

I think i will use the debit card and i dont have a problem with doing KYC. In these days, if we want government regulate cryptomarket, government should know because its about collecting taxes. I am believe there is nothing wrong with KYC because we not using crypto for criminal activity

that is almost exactly my point of view too. Avoiding KYC to me means, you are actually avoiding taxes. Or you are simply washing money or finance criminals.

Hi artbart, I will be honest, I would be very interested.
Some replies on here make me laugh. "Bitcoin is not to be spent in fiat currencies" well speak for you, but the big majority of people are like me, they either hold, or cash out their profit in fiat currencies to pay for flight tickets, nice vacations, nice gifts.
Who buys things with Bitcoin?

I will be very interested to use your service if the exchange rate is fair and close to what Bitstamp offers right now. However it looks like a tricky process, both Advcash and Mistertango had their cards disabled last year. Advcash is working hard again to deliver a new one but it is taking forever.

IMHO I think that this Mastercard debit card link is not necessary as long as you are well connected to any banks that you of course would offer fast deposits. I would actually prefer this one as I know I could easily liquidate my position with the exchange. What you are offering is good but it will just actually encourage me on spending my earnings more with a debit card in my hand. But on the other hand you will have a different market for what you are offering as not all people would like a debit card because of what I have said.

Great, I'll let you know when it is available from us. We'll use a different flow to process these payments, so, I hope we will build a sustainable service for crypto debit card. And again, as I've mentioned before, this card will not be crypto card, it will be a regular FIAT card, but processed, hopefully, in a smarter way, than competition does.

Good to hear :) I am not sure if you are able to give too many details (could be sensitive info), but how do you explain that some companies lost their contract with their debit card provider? I was getting worried. Even paranoid, I thought it was the end for these types of services (Payeer also lost a contract).
Are there many providers on the market?

And one last question, do you think you'll be able to send the card to Asian countries? (usually this kind of service is restricted to Europe). I am actually a citizen of Europe, but spend most of my time in Asia (two residences). Thanks and good luck guys!

Actually this is very interesting, but what about crypto values? If for example now I use a crypto debit card to buy something and after a few minutes the price drops, won't that hurt? Then what about the security? Seeing that there is still a lot of fraud and the vulnerability of losing coins, I don't think it is suitable if it is used as a debit card because it is less efficient. But if it can be overcome it may not be a problem and a good step.

i dont see the need of this one although the idea is nice and really convinient. All the functions youve mention are all can be done using our personal mobile phones. Here in my country, there is this one application which can withdraw your crypto or even send or transfer funds using QR codes. I guess this is the same function you are reffering to.

Yes, such a debit card would be very convenient to use. I used to use a virtual wallet for settlements with online stores, and Bitcoin could be used there as an additional service. That is, it was possible to transfer Bitcoin to this wallet, however, it is no longer possible to withdraw funds from Bitcoin from this wallet. As soon as Bitcoin enters the wallet, it is withdrawn by the bank, and the same amount in Bitcoin remains in the account. At any time, you can make a purchase by removing a certain number of bitcoins, which come to the seller already converted to normal currency at the rate at the time of the transaction. Very comfortable, I liked it. You can follow the course of Bitcoin and make purchases when it has a high rate, but it does not need to be cashed.

It may look easy, effective and useful, but it looks wasteful. In addition, the value of unstable coins makes it uncomfortable. Not all will use a debit card and certainly it will be wiser for people who are able to do it.

I'm not interested in a debit card at all. The exchange price is different on each exchange. I am sure that the price of such centralized centers will be lower. Why sell bitcoin cheaper? The relevance of such cards will be only in the case when it will be possible to spend bitcoin for purchases without exchanging for Fiat but it is still very far away.

Crypto debit i think, cause is simple and Don't need bringing something  ;D

moreover bitcoin has a high volatile, so it's hard to determine. and I think there will be many people who don't dare to use it, because they are at high risk

It depend on users ,as some might like it but other don't.those who are crypto trader and big investor they would love to pay using these cards but those who are small investor or trader will avoid it in risk of getting less value while spending.i think Fiat and crypto combined facility should be there while payment so that user can decide from which to pay and users should get rewarded while paying with crypto.

Crypto debit card for fiat payments weren't much into usage, earlier such cards came into usage with accessibility to limited stores. As years pass the need for Cryptocurrency and the usage can be seen all around. An initiation of debit card for fiat payments will not be big shortly but in long run it'll surely reach users same as the normal debit card users.

If there is crypto debit card, i will sign up and want to have one. Its must be good step for cryptomarket if that happen because its getting closer to mass adoption. I am believe this will happen really soon because crypto already recognized in several country

If this happen, i am think many crypto community will celebrate this. Off course i will use this innovation because it will help us spending our crypto in real world and can use in merchant.

It would be good news for the crypto user and also for people who don't know about crypto. And perhaps, the bank can integrate this and explain to their customer, so they will know what benefits of the card is. I think this card would be accepted in the country which approves the crypto so people can pay something with that crypto debit card and besides that, they can also have the investment which could be another benefit of the card. It would help the mass adoption too in many places if this is a success and I am sure that many people will open their eyes about the technology because I believe many people were aware of the new technology that already exist.

Yeah, there are many advantages and positive influences for crypto if a crypto debit card can be made, but the question is who will make crypto debit card platform? bank? or other agencies? while we are still struggling with the legalization and acceptance of the bank

Bitcoin debit card for fiat will be a very nice idea and believe many Cryptocoins enthusiasts are going to buy into the idea. I don't think we have more easy way of using bitcoin and fiat than this.

I would gladly have purchased such a card, it will expand the possibilities of using cryptocurrency, because now it is necessary to make many intermediary operations before using cryptocurrency to pay bills or services. And of those projects that are already offering such cards, not one has completed the development and has not presented a truly finished product. We are waiting for geniuses and crypto fiat debit cards!

It is not really a promotional thing to show off to people to get others interested in bitcoin. As long as there are huge fee's there will not be enough interest to it at all. I mean debit cards still tied to banks and these new coinbanks and what not type of places just focuses on getting as much customers as they can and just work with a bank in their country.

So, basically you are opening a new account in their country, that's seriously wrong. Considering shady stuff banks do to make a buck you basically give all your info to a bank you have no connection to at all, they can charge you couple hundred bucks yearly forever and you wouldn't know about it until interest rates go so high you will be summoned to court or pay and what not.

Hence, I think until someone does this in a legit manner, all of them are incredibly shady and expensive and will not be used properly.

Using debit card is an old feature which is already implement to fiat and i think we should be more inovative to see crypto one step a head against fiat moreover crypto debit cards only will be used for limited access because crypto currently only recognize as digital asset but not as payment tools and for me if this implement to crypto i think it would be lack of interest

there are many project/company who are giving crypto cards but we need these project/company as self entity to provide best crypto to fiat conversion rate ,i.e it become self bank rather than other bank partnership.as per now simple debit card are fine and crypto cards can not be affordable by normal traders as it is risky to hold asset if you are not investor.in future we might see major bank going towards crypto to capture share for them and providing crypto to fiat service.

Using a crypto debit card for fiat payments will really be a good thing for me. I usually hold crypto and always wanted withdraw it to my fiat bank account so that I can use them for electronic payment system. If we will be having cryptocurrency debit card then I do not have to transfer it first to my bank account and exchange it. Hence, it will be used directly if I make transactions.