Mastercard announced that in partnership with the Central Bank of The Bahamas and Island Pay they started the world’s first central bank digital currency-linked card.
As cryptocurrencies increasingly go mainstream, the pressure is creating on the world’s biggest central banks. In order to push ahead with their plans to issue digital cash and fight off private sector threats to traditional currency.
Today, Mastercard and Island Pay initiated the launch of a Bahamian prepaid card that supports the local central bank digital currency (CBDC), the Sand Dollar. More so, the Sand Dollar became the first fully-established digital version of fiat currency in October 2020.
Moreover, the Bahamas Sand Dollar prepaid card provides people the choice to convert the digital currency to traditional Bahamian dollars. They can now pay for goods and services anywhere Mastercard is accepted.
Island Pay Co-founder Richard Douglas said,
We are able to issue a prepaid card unlike any other in the world. We are now able to bring immediate, critical benefits to our customers at a time when they are looking to find new, innovative ways to pay.
Only select merchants accepted Sand Dollar through a digital application that requires user registration. Now, the new prepaid card can be used with any merchant that accepts Mastercard.
In addition, Mastercard is moving fast to position itself in the CBDC space. Even more, it reveals a testing platform for central bank cryptocurrency pilots. And prepares its network to handle the direct processing of crypto payments later this year.
Furthermore, Mastercard helps consumers to spend their holdings through their crypto partnership. However, the partnership includes Wirex, Uphold, BitPay, and most recently, LVL.
Read more: https://coinquora.com/mastercard-island-pay-launch-cbdc-prepaid-card-in-bahamas/
