Moneygram, a popular peer-to-peer and cross-border money transfer service has become the latest mainstream payment processor to offer Bitcoin trading service in association with popular Bitcoin cash exchange Coinme. The one of its kind partnership would allow US customers to buy Bitcoin against cash at 12,000 retail kiosks starting this month, then another 5,000 locations in June.
Alex Holmes, MoneyGram Chairman, and CEO commented on their recent crypto association and said that their association to offer Bitcoin against cash would help in better crypto adoption across the US. He explained,
“This innovative partnership opens our business to an entirely new customer segment as we are the first to pioneer a crypto-to-cash model by building a bridge with Coinme to connect bitcoin to local fiat currency. Our unique, global network is an incredibly valuable asset, and we’re excited to open our platform to Coinme as we increasingly look to capture new growth by monetizing our network to new use-cases.”
Moneygram is one of the biggest names when it comes to wire transfer and the fact that they have partnered with a Bitcoin ATM service provider speaks volumes about the growing Bitcoin adoption. However, this won’t be the first crypto venture for the cross-border money transfer service provider, as it was a key strategic Ripple partner until the SEC lawsuit, following which it cut ties with the crypto company. Moneygram was utilizing Ripple’s cross-border decentralized solution called RippleNet like SBI in Japan, however, in its official statement post-SEC lawsuit filing the company said it wasn’t utilizing the Ripplenet services.
The facility to purchase Bitcoin directly against cash that too at thousands of retail stores across the US would surely add to the growing adoption curve with a recent survey indicating nearly 46 million US customers already hold cryptocurrencies.
