Holding money (or crypto) in PayPal is a terrible idea. They are not a bank, they do not abide by banking regulations. They can lock you out of your account and your money at any time and leave you going in circles with their offshore support.
Yes, they are somewhat of a necessary evil if you do any online peer-to-peer buying/selling, since they are the only money transfer service that provides some level of "buyer protection", but you want to do the bare minimum with PayPal to avoid unnecessary risk.
Link one bank account (not your primary) to PayPal to receive money, and transfer received money immediately. Link one credit card for purchases. Nothing else. Do not link debit cards, do not sign up for their "balance account" where money is held in PayPal (no matter how hard they push it with UI dark patterns in their app), do not sign up for their crypto account.
If you link your bank, and approve direct debit (it’s just a popup with yes/later - very risky move), they will eventually withdraw from it when there are any issues. And most likely you’ll lose more disputes when your bank is linked - but no proof of this so take it with a grain of salt.
Mercury's personal banking product allows you to reject ACH transactions before they clear. They also allow you to generate virtual account numbers, so you can easily cut off an entity without having to change your main account number. Unfortunately Mercury charges a monthly fee.
I used Mercury when I had an LLC and had a great experience. It feels like they're the only bank that's not 10 years behind in technology. I've never tried their personal banking, but the ACH denial power makes me a lot more curious.
I use mbank.pl (Poland, EU regulations apply). What do consumers do if they have accounts in banks which don't have this feature in case they want to revoke DD consent?
Staring at a “you can no longer do business with PayPal” email myself. No clue what I did, no recourse, now locked out of a fuckton of global marketplaces and peer to peer transactions that uniquely only work on a platform like PayPal.
I had one of these. My account ended up eventually being reinstated. No reason was given for the initial account freeze or reinstating.
One thing I did - in response to them saying I could no longer do business, I told them that they also could no longer do business with me, requested a copy of all of the user data they had on me under CCPA, and told them to then delete all of my personal information.
They did not actually comply and I didn't pursue. I probably should, though.
you should get a lawyer and try to sue in small claims court, it is the fastest path vs. anything they will surface to you. even by saying this I put myself at risk but they are truly a demonic organization
Those are functions of a marketplace, a low-cost pseudo-legal system so that you hopefully avoid using a state's costly and slow legal system. But if marketplaces also own the medium of exchange, e.g. marketplaces that issue tokens and only allow transacting in tokens (Paypal behind the scenes), their economic incentive is not to resolve disputes, but to create as many barriers as possible to converting tokens back into value as they can get away with, since this becomes the profit center of the business.
And, when the only medium of exchange available to consumers and merchants is through one of these tokenized marketplaces, getting locked out of marketplaces means getting locked out of doing business entirely with no recourse or alternative.
Mediums of exchange should be neutral, and self-sovereign exchange has to be an option in order for marketplaces to offer competitive marketplace services, else they just abuse their monopoly on medium of exchange.
It's pretty nice, e.g. that when I buy a leash, it doesn't also have to walk the dog. Maybe for some, it's ideal to have someone else walk the dog, and the dog walker can even insist on bringing their own leash, but having the option of buying my own leash, putting it on my dog, and walking it myself means I don't need anyone's permission to own a dog, (not a big deal in the case of dog-walkers since there are so many) and substantially lowers the premium that dog-walkers can command in the marketplace for their services.
"If only there was a technology which fixes this..."
"Those are functions of a marketplace"
Then it seems you should have said "If only there was a technology and a marketplace which fixes this..."
And no, it doesn't exist because handling disputes is a hard problem. It's the actual moat of PayPal (and credit card companies) and the reason why they can get away with their crappy behaviour.
The problem is that there are two parties in any transaction, and power users/casual users swayed by marketing will be the ones that will choose the medium on which the transaction will take place.
So while you may want a self-sovereign exchange, your counterparty doesn't give a shit about your preferences, or is actively happy with using PayPal (Because their dispute resolution is better biased towards their side of the transaction, or because they just never gave it a second thought.)
Good point. I should have clarified that I'm referring specifically to PayPal in the US, which themselves state that "PayPal is not a bank, does not take deposits and is not FDIC insured".
It isn’t subject to the EU statutory deposit insurance, however.
Edit: The above means that deposits on your PayPal account aren’t insured, different from regular bank accounts in the EU. This is a frequently emphasized caveat regarding the use of PayPal as a bank account in the EU.
You'd be surprised. A lot of sellers don't "cash out" from paypal all that often, letting tens of thousands pile up. (And inevitably, some of them get hit with arbitrary account closures and have that money seized)
> Link one bank account (not your primary) to PayPal to receive money, and transfer received money immediately.
Costs 1.5%. Or wait a few days.[1] Plus a fee for receiving cryptocurrency.
There are additional fees for buying cryptocurrencies, other than PayPal's own.
And none of this is FDIC insured.
I assume you can't use Crypto instead of the bank account link, you probably require both. Otherwise this might have some use as another blast radius reducer for Paypal's antics.
I switched to a hardly used checking account for paypal after they held $20 hostage for a couple months after selling an old video card on ebay. I'd heard some one say their bank account had become frozen by paypal during a dispute and that event reminded me of it enough to get some separation.
I always keep a few bucks on the PayPal card to forget about until the next time I don't have my card and I'm like, "oh shit I have enough for a beer on this bastard" and it's like a mini-Christmas.
The thing that gets me is the 40% cash back on Walmart purchases up to 500$. It's such an incredible incentive it has to be shady af. Are the Rand oligarchs trying to buy out the poor? We'll never know because poor people don't have PayPal accounts.
"A something-or-another big enough to give you everything you want is a something-or-another big enough to take from you everything you have." -Voltaire
What’s odd is that Germans LOVE using PayPal. The pseudo banking system that PayPal offers is apparently light years ahead of traditional banking in Deutscheland.
The banking system is fine. It’s just that credit card use is not very widespread in Germany. PayPal (linked to bank accounts) is then fairly convenient online.
This is all true, but are they actually any worse than any other crypto exchange? I just take it as a given that a crypto exchange can lock me out and steal my money at any time with no legal consequence, and so I try to keep as little money in them as possible. And at least PayPal is older and likely to have more senior engineers and fewer vibe coders, and thus be less likely to lose everything because of an elementary security error.
Why does their support being "offshore" matter at all? If they wanted to provide good, user-friendly customer support, they would, regardless of where the reps are?
They marked my account as hacked (it wasn't), and the first two submissions of a photo of my driver's license from my phone were rejected... not until the third time after calling the third operator was like.. yep, that's a driver's license with your name on it.
That's not even close to the worst stories I've heard... like running Rippa through the ringer.
Fair enough, maybe "outsourced" would be a better way to put it. Basically they want support to cost them as little as possible and do not particularly care whether it actually offers any useful help to customers.
More specifically, their support cannot actually do anything to resolve problems. They read off what their computer screen is telling them. They can't take any actions to fix things.
Offshore support is unloved and powerless. They can't and won't fix any issue. They exist to fulfill the obligation to provide support in the cheapest form possible.
real question because i don't know, what do people actually buy with crypto other than other money or illegal stuff? i presume paypal won't be happy with you buying/selling drugs with it
There are legit uses that enterprise companies are using today, but they are few and far between in comparison to day trading/speculation/etc. For example, moving money from different currencies usually requires foreign exchange fees which can be hefty - whereas if you buy some stablecoin in a local currency and then sell that stablecoin in the currency you want to have in your bank account, you pay tiny transaction costs and thats it. This is a real problem for companies who have operations in tons of countries, and have to manage bank accounts and local entities in all of those countries. Imagine reducing your profit by 1-2% just because you want your profits in ireland instead of mexico. Stablecoins make that into <0.5%, which is many millions.
To answer your question, I hardly buy anything with crypto because there's barely support... Hopefully this is a catalyst for change.
I feel like this is the wrong question to ask. Instead try "why would someone purchase with crypto over fiat?".
I prefer to use crypto for international online purchases because the transaction and conversion fees from my native currency are way too high. With crypto it's a one off deposit fee and then gas is trivial these days.
Most large company entries into the crypto space seem to fizzle out and disappear due to lack of use, and how annoying it is to deal with currencies which fluctuate in value between the time you've spent them and the time the transaction is approved (I understand there are lightning networks), and then there's the issue with maintaining wallets.
It really just adds nothing but extra complexity to the existing electronic payment methods. And takes away tons of things like regulators, regulations, consumer protections, strong case law.
I have a virtual crypto card and gave it to my daughter and she added it to the Google wallet on her android. She uses it anywhere to buy anything. My bank didn't want to open bank account to minor. Everything was set up in 10 minutes. I transfer to her some random coins and it just works.
I also use it myself as a backup abroad when my regular bank foreign account doesn't work for any reason.
I got the card in the middle of the night in 10 minutes.
Used everywhere to buy everything? Some serious evidence is required to support this claim. I bet she can't even buy candy at your neighbourhood convenience store.
The only use-case I've heard for cryptocurrencies that doesn't just sound like a get-rich-quick-speculative-betting-scam is providing financial services to the un-banked.
I bought a Go board and some stones from GoGameGuru back in the day. A bitcoin was only 200-ish Euros back then. Funny to think how much that's gone up.
I know quite some Russian companies using bitcoins t to trade with western companies. For example large ad networks and bookies that operate there and pay in bitcoins. Malta, Switzerland are quite popular for these constructions.
Stablecoin payments are currently a hugely growing business, mainly for B2B payments as I understand it. I think its really hard for people who have absorbed 10 years of anti-crypto groupthink from HN to digest the fact that crypto is here to stay and is finding legitimate use cases.
Stablecoin payments really are just better:
- Instant settlement
- Extremely cheap
- Extremely reliable
- Highly programmable
- Built on open protocols
- International
There are no traditional banking systems that offer all of these properties!
If anyone is tempted to reply with "okay but that could have been done with a database" I would really encourage that person to try to think hard about why that didn't happen.
Yeah, its amazing how much anti-crypto HN is. I decided to invest entire year in learning technology and I couldn't be happier on that decision. The entire ecosystem of mainstream coins is mind-blowing and too big to fail at this point.
I once had to go through a SWIFT certification and it was a nightmare… They make you jump through so many rings… They make you buy hardware from them (for their certification runs), their documentation is awful. Their test environment is awful (no logs, no clear error messages, etc). Sadest time of my life.
The point of cash is that it represents transferrable value that doesn't require an intermediary between you and the person you're transacting with. And yet, banks and credit card companies exist and deal with cash. This does not mean that cash is a useless concept.
This point is conveniently missing. There's simply more money to be made! Now get out of here with your nonsense ideas of decentralizing money. It's bad for business.
The power of not needing companies like PayPal does not preclude them from offering services that ease its use.
The benefit comes from having the option to go elsewhere. A business that cannot lock you in is more likely to try to retain your custom by offering a good service.
Or Coinbase, or Cash App, or Venmo, or any of the other random places you can buy cryptocurrency. If it's not on the blockchain, it's not cryptocurrency; it's just an IOU until you withdraw to a private wallet.
Which can still be useful. Just like banks used to issue "IOUs" in exchange for depositing your gold coins, so that it was easier and safer to transfer small amounts.
That is the point! You don't need companies like Paypal... Companies often offer services that are "not needed" because people like convenience, ease of use, etc.
You don't need Paypal to use Bitcoin, but there's nothing in the spec that prohibits it.
I think their point is that in the end, most people want convenience. That convenience requires centralization, which eliminates a lot of the supposed benefits that something like cryptocurrencies were promoted with. We've already seen it play out very poorly several times in crypto already.
This adds convenience because I can instantly send ETH from Robinhood to PayPal to Coinbase to my Ledger, without dealing with banking rails or creating a taxable event.
It's not that simple, there's a niuance there - tradeoffs are to to be made if we want to have a decentralized system; it will not scale to the whole planet, if running a node is accessible; and it must be so, otherwise it's not decentralized.
The reality is, we will have a mix of custodian - through third-party - and self-sovereign usage; depending on the context and user's skill
It’s a grift, that’s why. Pedophile protector administration has silently dropped all of the regulatory lawsuits related to digital currency. There is minimal or no oversight right now. The pedophile in chief and family himself have also rug pulled their own tokens and not many people are caring.
I used to work at a few big banks, and because of the "friendly" nature of digital currencies. The traditional banking entities are trying to get in on the grift while they can.
The Internet is decentralized but most of us use ISPs to connect to it. Most of can't access the Internet without these companies.
In practice, the word "decentralized" just speaks to whether anyone can join in the protocol if they want. But it doesn't mean the protocol is easy to implement.
Just to echo other sentiments. Don't use PayPal to hold your crypto. Yes it will open the gateway to existing PayPal users and enable them to transact in these currencies. But the reality is that these centralised entities do not operate under an ethical code the way you would expect them to. They make unilateral decisions about what happens to your account and funds without asking you a single question. Be very careful. I was not a banking skeptic before. I have quite happily used my bank account, credit cards, PayPal and everything else. But now. I am not so sure. The level of control they have over your finances and ability to transact is unnerving. What they do with your money you can't control. When they decide you are no longer a favourable actor you can't control. Minimise exposure to these entities please.
Once upon a time, their corporate and developer sites were x.com even, before they moved to a more professional domain and later sold that one back to Elon.
Someone mentioned this kind of thing in the npm breeches last week. You get desensitized to non-standard “official” urls and it makes it easier for phishers.
I’ve happily avoided Paypal in the last .. 6 years or so. Ever since Revolut came up with disposable cards I’m much less hesitant to give my card details to someone, also PP never stopped being shady and user-hostile in the meantime.
So I’ll continue to avoid them in the next 6 years as well.
One of the reasons I don't think crypto can succeed is because people will only use it if it's convenient, which very likely means corporate involvement, which of course ultimately defeats the whole argument of being decentralized.
Without convenience it will not be successful as a common currency. It does not need convenience to succeed in other ways. For example, as a store of value.
Literally any scarce and durable good can be a store of value. A pound of Osmium is about a million bucks. So building massive server farms to store something equivalent to an inert rock is kind of uninteresting.
Title: PayPal [..] Reimagining How Money Moves to Anyone, Anywhere.
Text: PayPal users in the U.S. can begin [..] today, with international expansion [..] starting later this month.
So immediately out of the box it is exactly NOT for "anyone" and NOT "anywhere".
This is contagious: a couple of years ago Gnosis tried to launch their Gnosis Card[1] on Berlin DappCon with the exact same slogan: "Anyone, anywhere" while only accepting applications from a select group of people living in select EU countries.
I have had discussion with their CEO right there regarding this marketingspeak but he did not seem to grasp what's the problem at all here.
"Look how global we are… as long as you have a U.S. address, the correct passport, a bank account in a supported country, a smartphone with the correct OS."
Well in fairness they really have reimagined how money moves to anyone anywhere, they just haven't changed it yet. Plus they used a verb tense suggesting the process is ongoing. If they said "we changed how money moves to anyone anywhere" then that would be inaccurate, but that's not what they said.
It is almost like there were two departments in play. One that did reimagine how the global crypto money works, and the other who cannot image transacting without a recent utility bill. And they met in the press release.
I will never trust Paypal with anything again after they completely botched up the closing of my deceased parent's account. It was a dystopian nightmare to try and get them to understand the situation, and every support person who replied to the ticket started from scratch to give a wholly new, and yet equally unhelpful, take on the situation.
It took nearly six months to fully close down the account and many, many phone calls, which were equally difficult because it's nearly impossible to speak to a real person, and when you do finally get connected to a real person they just hang up on you when they realize they can't solve your issue in under five minutes. Paypal is one of the worst companies I have ever had the misfortune of dealing with, and money or crypto is the last thing I would trust them with.
Like with most things, if you put a serious amount of money through your account they will assign you a personal account manager who will bend over backwards for you. Otherwise they couldn't care less :( source: experience
Paypal has supported Ethereum and Bitcoin for years, in the US, most of the comments on this thread are irrelevant and unrelated to the current press release
Oh absolutely. They even explain it right in the press-release: "users in the U.S. can [...] with international expansion [...] starting later this month".
Of course it will be as far from "anyone" or "anywhere" as possible, because they will start the crypto expansion in a much more restrictive fashion than TradFi.
So hold on, does this mean I can pay with crypto anywhere that accepts Paypal? Because if so that's kind of a big deal, but not at all clear to me if that is the case...
The current administration is fully embracing crypto - the Trump family is reaping significant benefits. Hence, all the banks are getting into all the action as well.
Wake me when eBay accepts BTC in exchange for silver dollars or even collector coins. They're still afraid to do the very hard thing and challenge the status quo on an even playing field.
Yes, I switched my bank account to a Cash Management account (Fidelity) and get ATM fees and international fees reimbursed, this has renewed my cash usage and eliminated my card usage. I love it!
I hate paypal, because they froze my money for 6 months and destroyed my mental health for weeks. Compared to other people my situation was not even bad.
When Bitcoin first hit public consciousness the knock from economists was that it had a built-in deflationary spiral and that seems to be true. The price keeps going up and up with a few noted bumps. Rising value is great for speculators but it's a death knell for an actual spending currency. You'd be nuts to spend it if you expect it to appreciate. That's why central banks aim for low but positive inflation.
I think the difference here is that Bitcoin is predictable deflationary vs fiat being unpredictable. If you can know in advance the rate, it becomes sorta like an investment vehicle, where instead of dividends you get appreciation of the assets.
To look at it another way - why one would spend $100 from their brokerage account if they know a year later they can spend $110?
Bitcoin is not remotely predictable. The value has swung wildly over the past 5 years. Dropping more than 50% then gaining 200%. By comparison, USD has been rock solid even with the recent run of inflation. An actually circulating currency causes a panic at an 8% drop in value and yet there was zero macroeconomic impact from BTC dropping 50%. BTC is less stable than Turkish Lira.
The same can be said for stocks, and they are considered a good investment if you are in the knows. As an example, Tesla lost a third of its value this year.
Aside from tax implications, there's no difference between spending $1000 from your salary, and spending $1000 in Bitcoin and rebuying that amount from your salary.
That's not how any of this works. You may not receive any interest on your stablecoin balance, but the issuer certainly does. Why would they offer to lend money to the US government at zero when they can get the market rate and pocket it? What's more, these are mostly short-term instruments This means any increase in inflation will be reflected in their yield.
> You may not receive any interest on your stablecoin balance, but the issuer certainly does
A bunch of zero marginal cost capital funding purchases of U.S. debt would absolutely push down rates, possibly lower than inflation, because if you’re a stablecoin issuer you’re not constrained by yield.
This is a dumb-money venture. And if there is this much money that is this dumb, Treasuries aren’t the worst place for it to go.
Even if every dollar of market cap for every crypto currency in the world was invested into us treasuries, it would still be a drop in the bucket and wouldn't drastically change rates.
> those trilions and trilions of dollars of stablecoins sure are bringing down the us' cost to borrow
If you think trillions of dollars in de novo price-insensitive demand doesn’t move a market, even one as deep as the Treasury market, I’ve got a stablecoin to sell you.
Yes, trillions of dollars of new price-insensitive demand would move the treasury market. That's why I named that number! But, there just isn't that much value in stablecoins.
It’s actually more of a win-win situation if you look closely.
Stablecoin issuers earn yield from holding U.S. Treasuries, which sustains their business model. Meanwhile, people in distressed economies get practical access to a digital dollar, often cheaper and faster than navigating restrictive exchange rules or paying steep conversion fees at money-changers. That’s meaningful when local currencies are unstable or losing value.
Of course, not all stablecoin issuers are trustworthy, and some governments under economic distress may ban or limit these instruments. But when the setup works, both sides benefit.
The foreign individual is likely better off in game theory terms, but their country is collectively likely worse off due to a reduction in their central bank's independence and ability to perform seigniorage/print money. Difficult to ban for the foreign nation, and probably results in a greater need for dollars for their government also.
> congrats if you buy a stablecoin - you've effectively financed the US gvt at 0%.
USDC on Coinbase yields interest. The USDC people make a little spread on it, but you aren't financing the US government at 0%, you're financing them at market rates. There is counterparty risk just like with a bank. Unlike a bank, there are liquid markets onchain for other fungibles.
It doesn't cost a stablecoin anything but a bit of electricity to manufacture a "coin". The coin is valued at whatever the peg is, but it doesn't move the m2 needle or any other measure of circulation, until they purchase a treasury (or whatever they claim is backing). How much did it cost mr stablecoin to do all that? And you better believe the US Gov NEEDS this to happen.
Russia's take on the system is correct and we're seeing ASIANs and BRICS run away as fast as possible from $.
Ways out include total protectionism/mercantilism or war.
Gold is parabolic now. 10k by March is completely doable.
US govt is financed at whatever rate the stable-coin issuer finances at, which is likely a mixture of T-bills, fed overnight interest rates (via bank accounts), and other assets.
> congrats if you buy a stablecoin - you've effectively financed the US gvt at 0%.
As MMT teaches us, a government that issues its own currency does not need to borrow to finance itself, as it can create the money it needs, though it may still issue debt for other reasons.
I mean if the US gov moderately lowers the amount of debt it issues (and starts printing more to cover the difference), inflation will go way up, which seems pretty bad.
Having access to USD is still a lot better than whatever local currency most of these countries have. All those without any real central bank independence (though FED independence has become more questionable in the US as well).
Oh yeah, if you get a USD savings account from major nationwide banks you'll be getting exciting interest rates of up to 0.02% [1], assuming you have a 'relationship bonus'. BofA gets up to 0.04% [2], with the right tiers.
...fleecing the poor worldwide...stablecoins don't change much in this
Just Devil's Advocate, but isn't that a reason not to use stablecoins? I mean, I can participate in the fleecing of the poor without changing anything at all apparently.
I don't know what the effect is called, but suddenly some unrest in some country or inflation in another calls for creating a whole new money system. It seems unreasonable and I'm a bit suspicious of where it comes from.
This is the worry of globally-available USD stablecoins.
By swapping the volatility from crypto to lower USD volatility, they effectively create a funnel from riskier currencies into dollars.
Which is the same state that previously existed... except now facilitated by the crypto industry's global accessibility/UX and with less international regulation.
Blessing USD stablecoins at the US federal level was a smart move (from the US-perspective) as it creates a much bigger demand for dollars, and if the US didn't do it then China or OPEC would have eventually gotten around to it as an end-run around dollar hegemony.
Winners:
- Crypto industry (more volume to skim)
- US Treasury (more demand for debt)
Losers:
- Countries with less-stable currencies (lose further control of monetary policy)
- China / OPEC (miss opportunity to push dedollarization further)
TBD:
- Money laundering (once volume grows, KYC and traceability will follow)
The total stablecoin marketcap is not that high relative to US debt, and open question whether they're actually buying all the treasuries they claim. Tether has never been audited.
> The GENIUS Act requires permitted payment stablecoin issuers to maintain reserves backing outstanding payment stablecoins on at least a one-to-one basis, and provides that reserves may only consist of certain specified assets, including US dollars, federal reserve notes, funds held at certain insured or regulated depository institutions, certain short-term Treasuries and Treasury-backed reverse repurchase agreements, and money market funds.
> In addition, the GENIUS Act requires stablecoin issuers to provide monthly public reporting as to the composition of their reserve portfolios on their website, and requires larger issuers (with more than $50 billion in consolidated total outstanding issuance) to publish annual audited financial statements. These monthly reports must be examined by a registered public accounting firm, and the CEO and CFO of a permitted payment stablecoin issuer must certify the accuracy of these reports to the primary federal payment stablecoin regulator or state payment stablecoin regulator, as applicable.
With regard to Tether none of this is applicable as they aren't compliant with the GENIUS Act. They are in fact attempting to launch a totally separate stablecoin to try to get some of that market: https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/boards-policy-regulat...
Right, and who is looking at it anyways? Let's not kid ourselves, noone at the SEC will be enforcing "genius" act. Does anyone realistically think otherwise?
If it really is the goal to increase treasuries demand by means of stablecoins, then I would expect them to enforce this. If the stablecoins aren't really buying the assets then they do nothing for demand.
If another goal is to enrich the Trump family, then the SEC could forgo enforcement on the World Liberty Financial stablecoin. But they could still enforce the act for everyone else.
Increasing demand for treasuries, thus keeping interest rates down, also directly benefits Trump because he's bought at least $100 million in bonds since becoming president.
Stable coins can print anytime they want, there's no one at the SEC that will regulate it in this admin. As a matter of fact it's pretty well accepted in some circles, especially on subreddits, that Tether did exactly that, printed usdt, purchased btc at effectively 0 cost basis, inflating bitcoin prices by decreasing supply and then turned around and purchased treasuries. Cantor Fitzgerald ran that for them.
Further, stable coins / crypto are almost certainly being used to slop up as much liquidity as possible and has essentially so far pulled 4 trillion out of circulation. If not for that sleight of hand trick, hyperinflation, at least in the USA, would have already happened. Probably still will as there's only so much can kicking that can occur. I know of 30 year olds that literally live in mom's basement and dump nearly all of their just above minimum wage checks straight into Robinhood to blindly purchase crypto. Will forever beat inflation is the mentality.
Sure looks like there's going to be lots of pain for poor and middle class people in the next 5 years.
what's the end goal of stablecoins, besides the immediate grift?
do they think countries' populations will "opt in" into dolarizing that country econony (a la argentina in the 80s) bypassing their central bank opinions?
or is this much simpler and is just "ebay now works as crypto escrow for your bids"?
Yes, they are somewhat of a necessary evil if you do any online peer-to-peer buying/selling, since they are the only money transfer service that provides some level of "buyer protection", but you want to do the bare minimum with PayPal to avoid unnecessary risk.
Link one bank account (not your primary) to PayPal to receive money, and transfer received money immediately. Link one credit card for purchases. Nothing else. Do not link debit cards, do not sign up for their "balance account" where money is held in PayPal (no matter how hard they push it with UI dark patterns in their app), do not sign up for their crypto account.
What bank allows that on a consumer account?
For anyone curious, the fee is $240/yr.
I used Mercury when I had an LLC and had a great experience. It feels like they're the only bank that's not 10 years behind in technology. I've never tried their personal banking, but the ACH denial power makes me a lot more curious.
One thing I did - in response to them saying I could no longer do business, I told them that they also could no longer do business with me, requested a copy of all of the user data they had on me under CCPA, and told them to then delete all of my personal information. They did not actually comply and I didn't pursue. I probably should, though.
s/demonic/pernicious
Places like swapd that operate on crypto escrow every transaction to lessen these crypto problems.
And, when the only medium of exchange available to consumers and merchants is through one of these tokenized marketplaces, getting locked out of marketplaces means getting locked out of doing business entirely with no recourse or alternative.
Mediums of exchange should be neutral, and self-sovereign exchange has to be an option in order for marketplaces to offer competitive marketplace services, else they just abuse their monopoly on medium of exchange.
It's pretty nice, e.g. that when I buy a leash, it doesn't also have to walk the dog. Maybe for some, it's ideal to have someone else walk the dog, and the dog walker can even insist on bringing their own leash, but having the option of buying my own leash, putting it on my dog, and walking it myself means I don't need anyone's permission to own a dog, (not a big deal in the case of dog-walkers since there are so many) and substantially lowers the premium that dog-walkers can command in the marketplace for their services.
"Those are functions of a marketplace"
Then it seems you should have said "If only there was a technology and a marketplace which fixes this..."
And no, it doesn't exist because handling disputes is a hard problem. It's the actual moat of PayPal (and credit card companies) and the reason why they can get away with their crappy behaviour.
So while you may want a self-sovereign exchange, your counterparty doesn't give a shit about your preferences, or is actively happy with using PayPal (Because their dispute resolution is better biased towards their side of the transaction, or because they just never gave it a second thought.)
https://www.paypal.com/us/legalhub/paypal/program-banks-tnc
Edit: The above means that deposits on your PayPal account aren’t insured, different from regular bank accounts in the EU. This is a frequently emphasized caveat regarding the use of PayPal as a bank account in the EU.
My point is that one doesn’t get all the protections normally taken for granted for EU bank accounts.
Costs 1.5%. Or wait a few days.[1] Plus a fee for receiving cryptocurrency. There are additional fees for buying cryptocurrencies, other than PayPal's own. And none of this is FDIC insured.
[1] https://www.paypal.com/us/legalhub/paypal/pp-balance-tnc?loc...
I switched to a hardly used checking account for paypal after they held $20 hostage for a couple months after selling an old video card on ebay. I'd heard some one say their bank account had become frozen by paypal during a dispute and that event reminded me of it enough to get some separation.
The thing that gets me is the 40% cash back on Walmart purchases up to 500$. It's such an incredible incentive it has to be shady af. Are the Rand oligarchs trying to buy out the poor? We'll never know because poor people don't have PayPal accounts.
"A something-or-another big enough to give you everything you want is a something-or-another big enough to take from you everything you have." -Voltaire
Now instant payments using SEPA are mandatory and rolled out everywhere.
Has this been your experience with PayPal?
That's not even close to the worst stories I've heard... like running Rippa through the ringer.
More specifically, their support cannot actually do anything to resolve problems. They read off what their computer screen is telling them. They can't take any actions to fix things.
https://a16zcrypto.com/posts/article/stripe-bridge-acquisiti... has some examples
I feel like this is the wrong question to ask. Instead try "why would someone purchase with crypto over fiat?". I prefer to use crypto for international online purchases because the transaction and conversion fees from my native currency are way too high. With crypto it's a one off deposit fee and then gas is trivial these days.
Most large company entries into the crypto space seem to fizzle out and disappear due to lack of use, and how annoying it is to deal with currencies which fluctuate in value between the time you've spent them and the time the transaction is approved (I understand there are lightning networks), and then there's the issue with maintaining wallets.
It really just adds nothing but extra complexity to the existing electronic payment methods. And takes away tons of things like regulators, regulations, consumer protections, strong case law.
I also use it myself as a backup abroad when my regular bank foreign account doesn't work for any reason.
I got the card in the middle of the night in 10 minutes.
I think all that is simply awesome.
So that does not answer the question what legit stuff businesses do.
Stablecoin payments really are just better: - Instant settlement - Extremely cheap - Extremely reliable - Highly programmable - Built on open protocols - International
There are no traditional banking systems that offer all of these properties!
If anyone is tempted to reply with "okay but that could have been done with a database" I would really encourage that person to try to think hard about why that didn't happen.
The benefit comes from having the option to go elsewhere. A business that cannot lock you in is more likely to try to retain your custom by offering a good service.
You don't need Paypal to use Bitcoin, but there's nothing in the spec that prohibits it.
The reality is, we will have a mix of custodian - through third-party - and self-sovereign usage; depending on the context and user's skill
> Under capitalism necessities become luxuries, while luxuries become false necessities. Umair Haque
I used to work at a few big banks, and because of the "friendly" nature of digital currencies. The traditional banking entities are trying to get in on the grift while they can.
In practice, the word "decentralized" just speaks to whether anyone can join in the protocol if they want. But it doesn't mean the protocol is easy to implement.
Well, they're not above the law. They're effectively a bank and must follow the laws in the countries in which they operate.
https://www.attejuvonen.fi/paypal-sends-phishing-emails/
I could create an account, buy a domain name with a gift card, and put your username in the WHOIS.
So I’ll continue to avoid them in the next 6 years as well.
Text: PayPal users in the U.S. can begin [..] today, with international expansion [..] starting later this month.
So immediately out of the box it is exactly NOT for "anyone" and NOT "anywhere".
This is contagious: a couple of years ago Gnosis tried to launch their Gnosis Card[1] on Berlin DappCon with the exact same slogan: "Anyone, anywhere" while only accepting applications from a select group of people living in select EU countries.
I have had discussion with their CEO right there regarding this marketingspeak but he did not seem to grasp what's the problem at all here.
You can't make this shit up.
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4_6aOUagY4
"Look how global we are… as long as you have a U.S. address, the correct passport, a bank account in a supported country, a smartphone with the correct OS."
you wallet is self custodial there
It took nearly six months to fully close down the account and many, many phone calls, which were equally difficult because it's nearly impossible to speak to a real person, and when you do finally get connected to a real person they just hang up on you when they realize they can't solve your issue in under five minutes. Paypal is one of the worst companies I have ever had the misfortune of dealing with, and money or crypto is the last thing I would trust them with.
Of course it will be as far from "anyone" or "anywhere" as possible, because they will start the crypto expansion in a much more restrictive fashion than TradFi.
It's grift time baby!
There are sites that still support Visa / Mastercard but removed their Paypal support. SubscribeStar, for example.
People who love crypto will hate anything that has anything to do with legacy censorship-prone fraudulent financial institutions like PayPal.
Who is this for?
To look at it another way - why one would spend $100 from their brokerage account if they know a year later they can spend $110?
congrats if you buy a stablecoin - you've effectively financed the US gvt at 0%.
now the US gvt can inflate away that debt at 0 cost to them, and pass on the cost to you.
that's why a bunch of these stablecoin companies are pushing it as a way to save for people in distressed economies.
what a way to steal from the poor.
that's why the crypto act was called GENIUS act.
A bunch of zero marginal cost capital funding purchases of U.S. debt would absolutely push down rates, possibly lower than inflation, because if you’re a stablecoin issuer you’re not constrained by yield.
This is a dumb-money venture. And if there is this much money that is this dumb, Treasuries aren’t the worst place for it to go.
There is a floor to short term treasury rates because the Fed also runs overnight repo operations linked to the Fed funds rate
If you think trillions of dollars in de novo price-insensitive demand doesn’t move a market, even one as deep as the Treasury market, I’ve got a stablecoin to sell you.
Stablecoin issuers earn yield from holding U.S. Treasuries, which sustains their business model. Meanwhile, people in distressed economies get practical access to a digital dollar, often cheaper and faster than navigating restrictive exchange rules or paying steep conversion fees at money-changers. That’s meaningful when local currencies are unstable or losing value.
Of course, not all stablecoin issuers are trustworthy, and some governments under economic distress may ban or limit these instruments. But when the setup works, both sides benefit.
USDC on Coinbase yields interest. The USDC people make a little spread on it, but you aren't financing the US government at 0%, you're financing them at market rates. There is counterparty risk just like with a bank. Unlike a bank, there are liquid markets onchain for other fungibles.
Russia's take on the system is correct and we're seeing ASIANs and BRICS run away as fast as possible from $.
Ways out include total protectionism/mercantilism or war.
Gold is parabolic now. 10k by March is completely doable.
As MMT teaches us, a government that issues its own currency does not need to borrow to finance itself, as it can create the money it needs, though it may still issue debt for other reasons.
These typically pay interest. (Or have retail servicing costs attached.)
[1] https://www.chase.com/personal/savings/interest-savings/inte...
[2] https://www.bankofamerica.com/deposits/savings/savings-accou...
Just Devil's Advocate, but isn't that a reason not to use stablecoins? I mean, I can participate in the fleecing of the poor without changing anything at all apparently.
I don't know what the effect is called, but suddenly some unrest in some country or inflation in another calls for creating a whole new money system. It seems unreasonable and I'm a bit suspicious of where it comes from.
By swapping the volatility from crypto to lower USD volatility, they effectively create a funnel from riskier currencies into dollars.
Which is the same state that previously existed... except now facilitated by the crypto industry's global accessibility/UX and with less international regulation.
Blessing USD stablecoins at the US federal level was a smart move (from the US-perspective) as it creates a much bigger demand for dollars, and if the US didn't do it then China or OPEC would have eventually gotten around to it as an end-run around dollar hegemony.
Winners:
Losers: TBD:sure, it couldn't happen without the local warlords, but still...
> The GENIUS Act requires permitted payment stablecoin issuers to maintain reserves backing outstanding payment stablecoins on at least a one-to-one basis, and provides that reserves may only consist of certain specified assets, including US dollars, federal reserve notes, funds held at certain insured or regulated depository institutions, certain short-term Treasuries and Treasury-backed reverse repurchase agreements, and money market funds.
> In addition, the GENIUS Act requires stablecoin issuers to provide monthly public reporting as to the composition of their reserve portfolios on their website, and requires larger issuers (with more than $50 billion in consolidated total outstanding issuance) to publish annual audited financial statements. These monthly reports must be examined by a registered public accounting firm, and the CEO and CFO of a permitted payment stablecoin issuer must certify the accuracy of these reports to the primary federal payment stablecoin regulator or state payment stablecoin regulator, as applicable.
https://www.lw.com/en/insights/the-genius-act-of-2025-stable...
If another goal is to enrich the Trump family, then the SEC could forgo enforcement on the World Liberty Financial stablecoin. But they could still enforce the act for everyone else.
Increasing demand for treasuries, thus keeping interest rates down, also directly benefits Trump because he's bought at least $100 million in bonds since becoming president.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/trump-buys-more-100-mill...
Further, stable coins / crypto are almost certainly being used to slop up as much liquidity as possible and has essentially so far pulled 4 trillion out of circulation. If not for that sleight of hand trick, hyperinflation, at least in the USA, would have already happened. Probably still will as there's only so much can kicking that can occur. I know of 30 year olds that literally live in mom's basement and dump nearly all of their just above minimum wage checks straight into Robinhood to blindly purchase crypto. Will forever beat inflation is the mentality.
Sure looks like there's going to be lots of pain for poor and middle class people in the next 5 years.
do they think countries' populations will "opt in" into dolarizing that country econony (a la argentina in the 80s) bypassing their central bank opinions?
or is this much simpler and is just "ebay now works as crypto escrow for your bids"?
Doubly so when the feature being discussed is crypto related.
I agree that it is confusing.
Ideally, companies would have a page "all the domains we use" as part of their footer links.
So many companies that should know better are helping to enable phishing by using random domains.
(also thought that it's phishing or scam domain).