How Can Crypto Improve And Disrupt International Payments?
15 December 2023
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The last decade has seen a resurgence of projects in borderless payments, with the concept often hailed as a 'killer' use case for cryptocurrency.
Despite this, the industry is still waiting for a platform that effectively solves this issue at a large scale.
The demand is certainly there, with the traditional cross-border payments industry hitting $190 trillion in 2023 and crypto adoption particularly prevalent in lower to middle-income countries.
Current solutions do exist, but they are small, geographically specific and fragmented, largely due to variations in regional regulations.
Reading into these facts, it seems the future of cross-border payments could follow three potential paths:
- Maintaining the status quo
- A regional incumbent overcoming regulatory hurdles, or
- A new entrant disrupting the market using a completely left-field solution
Despite regulatory challenges, there is optimism about development across these paths as innovation competes to create better products, driving prices down.
Borderless payments are far from a new idea, but the industry's evolution has changed its feasibility, with improvements in blockchains, self-custody wallets, and stablecoin APIs.
Regulatory difficulties present a challenge but also an opportunity for new entrants, with incumbents often reluctant to take risks in a fast-growing yet vaguely-defined market.
Interestingly, "onramping" (getting into crypto) has largely been addressed, but "offramping" (swapping crypto for local currencies through major institutions), remains a problem due to bank restrictions, regulatory compliance, and limited liquidity.
Revenue in the crypto consumer business has historically come from a small percentage of users driving the majority of transaction volume or a large percentage of users representing a small portion of the volume.
One significant use case for cross-border payments is remittances to families back home, but educating and converting new crypto users is a massive task.
Despite these challenges, new entrants are finding innovative ways to make their mark in the industry, contributing to the dynamic landscape.
While the vision of borderless payments remains a work in progress, the strides made in infrastructure, regulatory advancements, and consumer reach provide a promising foundation for the future. Read more here.
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Can Zucoin Be Used For International Payment Transactions?
Modern, fast, cheap and easy global payments, once a distant dream, are creating a buzz again.
With the traditional international payments market hitting $190 trillion in 2023, the demand for a solution that can handle this mammoth scale is high.
The current scenario is like a jigsaw, broken due to regional rules.
Zucoin, having now executed many, many transactions on its beta Splitchain network since launching in Feb 2022, could offer a solution here.
There's an opportunity for Zucoin or its community to innovate here, carving out an efficient and cost-saving solution.
Bitcoin and Ethereum have already partially proven that an international digital asset can be used, mostly, without borders.
Even despite issues with traditional blockchains, they offer early glimpses into what is possible.
You could travel from Australia to Europe, to North America and pay with cryptocurrencies that are immediately converted into a local currency when you tap-to-pay.
Digital assets are shaping up to become a reliable international base asset, like gold, but far easier to travel around with.
Right now, "offramping"—turning crypto back into local currencies, is a big obstacle in the sector, largely due to bank limitations and lacking liquidity.
It's why Zucoin has increased attention towards their Zutopia marketplace in 2023.
A way to sidestep the many issues created by the traditional industries.
There are also, as we cover regularly, issues in the crypto industry surrounding scalability and efficiency limitations with traditional blockchains.
Safety and compliance is another area coming under more scrutiny and it's something Zucoin has spent a huge chunk of time considering and building into its Splitchain system, for example, with its two-factor transaction authentication (2FA) feature.
This, amongst a number of other architectural decisions made within Splitchain, aims to address these problems and many more.
The goal is to boost personal independence while elevating safety along the way.
An easy wallet app that allows people to self-manage these assets is key.
It's been a long-term focus for the Zucoin wallet app.
Reducing friction often improves adoption rates.
Another area of demand for international payments is fueled by remittances.
For example, people sending money back home to overseas families.
Zucoin, capable of tiny transactions—down to 32 decimal places of precision and without network fees, could greatly simplify this process, helping to encourage wider crypto use.
As third parties integrate Zucoin into their international payment platforms, the potential for the digital asset to be used internationally is straightforward from that point onwards.
The ongoing progress in Splitchain's infrastructure, improving regulatory standardizations creating clarity, and consumer reach are combining to lay a sturdy base for Zucoin.
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All the best,
—Rob
MyZucoins
Disclaimer: Of course, this is not advice, financial or otherwise. It’s also important to consider the risks and challenges associated with any potential benefits.