Mastercard Rolls Out System Allowing for Stablecoin Payments Directly From Crypto Wallet

A collaboration between financial services giant Mastercard and web3 tech company Immersve is set to offer a new option for paying physical, digital and metaverse purchases using crypto assets.

Immersve says the payment solution will enable consumers in New Zealand and Australia to use digital currencies directly from their web3 wallets to pay for goods and services in merchants that support Mastercard.

Users retain complete control of their crypto assets because the system does not require a third party to hold their funds as collateral. Customers continue to manage their assets until they make a purchase.

Circle-issued stablecoin USD Coin (USDC) will be used for all purchases. The dollar-pegged crypto asset will be converted to fiat currency and settled on Mastercard’s network during transactions.

Immersve says it will lean on Mastercard’s identity services and CipherTrace solution to address Know Your Customer (KYC) and Anti-Money Laundering (AML), online fraud detection and blockchain analytics.

Says Sandeep Malhotra, Mastercard’s executive vice president of Products & Innovation, Asia Pacific,“As Web2 and Web3 increasingly converge, Mastercard remains committed to partnering with like-minded organizations like Immersve to scale and secure the blockchain ecosystem to make simple, safe cryptocurrency transactions, and even payments in the metaverse, easily accessible to billions of consumers.”

Last year, Mastercard’s head of crypto and blockchain Raj Dhamodharan said that the payments giant is working to unlock the full potential of digital assets. In January, the firm partnered with crypto exchange Binance to launch the Binance Card in Brazil, which allows users to make purchases and pay bills using crypto.