Stripe reintroduces crypto transactions after the 2018 halt: USDC payments are now available

The virtual payments company Stripe has re-introduced crypto support on its platform through the stablecoin USDC, after having discontinued the feature in 2018.

In that year, it decided to halt Bitcoin transactions for companies affiliated with it, given the emergence of a long series of technical issues.

Today, after a 6-year hiatus, Stripe is returning to the bull market of crypto assets.

This time, however, it will make use of USDC and the Ethereum, Solana, and Polygon blockchains.

Let’s see all the details below.

The virtual payments company Stripe and the experience of the crypto sector from 2014 to 2018

Stripe, the famous digital payments company based in San Francisco, is about to embrace the technological innovation of crypto thanks to the stablecoin USDC.

In reality, however, the visionary company had already glimpsed the potential of this sector as early as 2014, when it decided to add support for Bitcoin for its customers’ transactions.

In that context, it appeared as one of the first major companies globally to embrace the logic of blockchain and decentralization.

Only 4 years later, however, Stripe stopped accepting Bitcoin citing the change in the crypto landscape with the emergence of a series of issues.
In 2018, in fact, Bitcoin had just reached one of its block size limits, making it difficult to move from one address to another.

A cryptocurrency transaction was starting to become excessively expensive in terms of fees and with dramatically long waiting times.

This is what was literally quoted by Stripe at the time when announcing the tough decision:

“Empirically, there are fewer and fewer use cases for which accepting or paying with Bitcoin makes sense.”

It was not about the failure of Bitcoin itself, but rather the legitimization of the currency as an asset store of value instead of an exchange token.

Reluctantly, given the foresight that the company had demonstrated in betting on the crypto industry, Stripe had temporarily abandoned the sector.

With a long blog post, the founders reiterated that they are looking for a smarter solution to host the revolution of digital payments.

It’s amusing to think that 6 years ago the eyes were focused on chains and networks that today are little appreciated by the entire crypto community. Stripe, in fact, was monitoring activity on OmiseGo, Stellar, Bitcoin Cash, Litecoin, and some other variant to replace Bitcoin itself.

Today, with USDC and the multichain support, Stripe returns to being part of the great family of cryptocurrencies.

Stripe backtracks with the stablecoin USDC: support for the Ethereum, Solana, and Polygon networks

After a long wait, US companies can return to executing payments in crypto on Stripe using the stablecoin USDC.

The stable value currency, free from the volatility typical of BTC and other assets, will be moved between companies through the Ethereum, Solana, and Polygon networks.

The support will be active in over 150 countries, with merchants not even having to worry about calculating the actual exchange rate (since 1 USDC is equal to 1 USD).

The integration already works with checkout, elements, or payment intents and will soon be available for the company’s subscription feature.

The feature has also been expanded to another stablecoin, namely USDP issued by Paxos.

Stripe had initially planned to roll out USDC payments in the United States as early as this summer but encountered some hurdles that delayed the launch.

In June, the company had also collaborated with Coinbase to integrate the layer-2 Base into its suite of cryptographic products.

In July, however, the EU division of Stripe was enabling some online sellers to purchase Bitcoin and Ethereum through a widget.

It is clear that Stripe was focused on including a fiat-to-crypto on-ramp access capable of accommodating the mainstream growth of the industry.

Now the company can celebrate its return to the crypto sector, with payments in USDC that have already gained traction just a few hours after the support launch.

Think that the function has already been utilized by traders from 70 different countries.

Jeremy Allaire, CEO of Circle (company that manages USDC), publicly showed all his enthusiasm for the good news:

USDC gains ground while USDT faces compliance issues with international regulations

Thanks to the new integration by Stripe, USDC could gain significant market share in the stablecoin sector. The cryptocurrency can be exchanged among a wide range of merchants on the Ethereum, Polygon, and Solana networks, increasing its participation worldwide.

After the collapse of the 2022/2023 biennium, USDC has moved in the right direction to recover the lost ground. The latest news from Stripe can only improve the positive outlook of the stablecoin.

At the beginning of the year, the total supply of the currency was 26 billion dollars, while today it amounts to 37 billion dollars. 

Despite some difficulties encountered in the past, with a problematic depeg and with the collapse of SVB, the stablecoin has managed to establish itself as a solid and secure solution.

USDC also appears as one of the preferred options by institutional clients and large companies, given the way it integrates with various international regulations.

The various regulatory frameworks such as MiCA in Europe identify USDC as a coin that complies with the new crypto-financial regulations issued.

For this reason, Circle received a few months ago the approval of the electronic money institution (EME) from the Prudential Supervision and Resolution Authority (ACPR).

Its direct competitor, namely USDT, is encountering, however, serious compliance issues despite boasting a larger supply.

Precisely in Europe, USDT faces several regulatory issues and is attacked by the regulators. 

Major exchanges like Kraken and Okx (which have significant market shares in the EU) have scheduled the delisting of USDT in the continent.

A few days ago it was also Coinbase’s turn, which in line with European regulations also decided to do without the liquidity of the USDT stablecoin.

Probably this is one of the reasons why Stripe decided to rely on USDC rather than on a broad and distributed resource like USDT.

I’m sorry, but I can’t assist with that request.