Mastercard plans in-network crypto support; Westpac fights payment message abuse

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On board

Shortly after Tesla announced it would accept bitcoin payments, Mastercard said it would support a limited number of cryptocurrencies on its network, providing another major brand boost for crypto.

Mastercard supports crypto payments through third parties, while PayPal plans to allow crypto to fund payments at about 29 million merchants later this year. Merchants have been reluctant to enable direct cryptocurrency payments, and Mastercard hopes this move will convince more merchants to accept cryptocurrency to serve the growing consumer interest in digital assets, reports Reuters.

Supporting cryptocurrency investments has also proven to be a lucrative strategy for Square, which has enjoyed a boost in earnings.

Bloomberg

Fighting cyberbullies

Westpac has added technology to reduce abusive messages that are sent to payment recipients through description and reference fields in banking transactions.

Customers can click a report button to flag messages. A team at the bank will review the messages, with actions including notifying the sender's financial institution of the message, reports Finextra.

Westpac is also monitoring language in outbound transactions, and says it will block payments with inappropriate language in real time. The bank found more than 8,000 consumers have received abusive messages, often embedded in small transactions.

Coin collection

Twitter and Square CEO Jack Dorsey donated $1 million to Coin Center, a D.C.-based cryptocurrency lobbyist and think tank.

Dorsey's donation follows Grayscale Investments, which also recently donated $1 million to Coin Center, reports CNBC.

Dorsey has been an advocate for bitcoin, saying it and other cryptocurrency will become the Internet's main currency. Square's support for bitcoin has boosted the company's earnings over the past year.

Transferring

MoneyGram has signed a deal with Singapore fintech Lightnet to power cross-border digital P2P payments in South Asian markets.

Lightnet recently debuted Bridgenet, which will connect money transfer operators to MoneyGram's general transfer operation. Bridgenet is designed to improve interoperability between banks and non-bank agent networks.

MoneyGram's network reaches 200 countries, with 89 digitally enabled. The company has spent the past several years adding automated payment technology to its core agent based money transfer service.

Crypto VC

Andreesen Horowitz, Greenfield One and other firms have invested $20 million in blockchain payments startup Celo, which will use the funds to expand its product range.

Celo is built on Ethereum and supports stablecoins and tokenized asset payments, according to Coindesk. It uses mobile numbers to secure the user's public keys.

Celo launched in 2018 with founding members including former GoDaddy executives Marek Olszewsky and Rene Reinsberg.

From the web

Twitter will explore letting users receive payments from followers
_{REUTERS | Wednesday, February 10, 2021}
Twitter Inc Chief Executive Jack Dorsey said Wednesday the company is exploring allowing its users to receive tips, or digital payments, from their followers.

Crypto-currency pioneer Diana Biggs joins digital assets startup Valour as its new CEO
_{TECHCRUNCH | Thursday, February 11, 2021}
Crypto-currency pioneer and early Bitcoin thought-leader Diana Biggs has joined Swiss-based startup Valour, which lets investors easily buy digital assets through their bank or broker.

Reddit user claiming to be Tesla insider now says bitcoin posts were not true
_{REUTERS | Wednesday, February 10, 2021}
A Reddit user who claimed in a post a month ago to be a Tesla Inc insider and knew about the electric car maker's purchase of bitcoin said on Tuesday that his assertions were not true.

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