PayPal Enables U.S. Business Accounts to Buy, Hold and Sell Crypto

PayPal
(PYPL)
will
let
its
business
clients
buy,
hold
and
sell
cryptocurrency
directly
from
their
accounts
in
the
U.S.,
potentially
opening
up
a
larger
market
for
the
payments
giant.

After
letting
its
retail
users
do
the
same
via
PayPal
and
Venmo
accounts
for
several
years
now,
the
company
also
saw
demand
from
business
owners
to
buy,
hold
and
sell
crypto,
the
company
said
Wednesday.

“Business
owners
have
increasingly
expressed
a
desire
for
the
same
cryptocurrency
capabilities
available
to
consumers,”
said
Jose
Fernandez
da
Ponte,
senior
vice
president
of
blockchain,
cryptocurrency,
and
digital
currencies
at
PayPal
in
a

statement.

The
payments
company
will
also
allow
U.S.
merchants
to
externally
transfer
cryptocurrency
on-chain
to
“eligible”
third-party
wallets,
according
to
the
statement.

To
start,
the
service
will
be
unavailable
to
business
clients
in
New
York
State,
the
company
said,
without
giving
a
timetable
for
when
that
would
change.
The
company
is
one
of
the
20
or
so

recipients
of
the
Empire
State’s
notoriously
stringent
BitLicense.
It
also
has
a
trust
license
from
the
state’s
Department
of
Financial
Services.

Since
2020,
PayPal
has
allowed
consumers
to
buy,
hold
and
sell
cryptocurrencies
directly
from
their
accounts.
Last
year,
it
unveiled
its
U.S.
dollar-denominated
stablecoin,
PayPal
USD
(PYUSD),
which
reached
a
$1
billion
market
cap
this
summer.