Uphold, the global digital money platform, has announced a tie-up with GlobaliD, the digital identity platform, for the launch of XRP cards which would be a debit card from Mastercard that provides up to 5% cashback in the digital currency XRP.
Uphold is reported to have more than 5 million customers and it provides digital money services to its users by giving access to more than 30 digital currencies and also giving them the ability to spend and convert the digital currencies into fiat as well. The platform also allows such conversions between fiat to digital and vice versa to be done very quickly which provides the users with a very wide variety of choices of currencies to choose from irrespective of the country that they are in.
The XRP debit card tries to combine the power and flexibility of the Uphold platform with the compliance and oversight that GlobaliD provides. Using the debit card, the users would be able to pay in fiat or digital currencies but the cashback would always be in XRP. This means that the users can continue to spend as usual while the XRP would continue to get accumulated in their digital wallets and they could either spend the XRP or continue to store it if they feel that XRP is worth holding for its price increase in the future.
“We’re delighted to be supporting GlobaliD with the XRP debit card,” said JP Thieriot, CEO Uphold. “The XRP community is one of the most engaged in the crypto sector and among Uphold’s most ardent users. It’s great that we’re able to give back through our support for this fantastic innovation.”
This is a shot in the arm for the XRP ecosystem as it throws open the crypto for mainstream usage and shows a way for users and developers for using XRP as a form of mainstream payments and rewards mechanism. The companies have said that XRP would be the starting point for this program which could expand to other cryptos also in the future depending on the adoption. Recently, Mastercard has been looking at ways by which it can make the crypto to fiat conversion easier for its merchant through tie-ups with Circle and Paxos, and this cashback use case from GlobaliD and Uphold for XRP should make more card issuers sit up and take notice as Ripple continues its battle with the SEC.