MasterCard Will Support Cryptocurrencies If It Is Supported by the Government

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MasterCard Will Support Cryptocurrencies If It Is Supported by the Government
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It seems that another company is turning positive towards cryptocurrencies in general. MasterCard, whose CEO’s recently dissed out digital currencies, calling them equivalent to junk, are now open about digital currencies.
Speaking to Financial Times, MasterCard’s Co-President for the Asia-Pacific region, Ari Sarkar, said that the company is positive and is open towards cryptocurrencies which are created and backed by governments across the globe.
He also says that the company is ready to support digital currencies as long as they are not anonymous and they meet stringent regulatory requirements of governments across the world. He also called cryptocurrencies an area of greater interest for the company.
Countries around the world, including India, China, Russia, England, Israel and Estonia among others have announced plans to launch their own cryptocurrencies, which would be regulated by the central banks of the respective countries.
But other than Venezuela, who recently launched their own currency, the Petro, the other countries have still not taken any concrete steps for launching digital currencies.
MasterCard’s CEO, Ajay Banga, in an earlier interview with Economic Times in October of 2017, had called digital currencies as junk and said that non-government mandated cryptocurrencies are a waste on global resources. He also said that their company would be the front runner in driving solutions for government launched cryptocurrencies across the world.
Earlier in February, both MasterCard and its rival VISA had reclassified cryptocurrency related transactions done using credit card as cash advance from the earlier classification of purchases.
Due to the change in classification, buyers of cryptocurrency using credit cards were forced to pay an extra 5 percent fee to the credit card merchant on top of the credit card fee charged.
But, the disgust MasterCard apparently has towards digital currencies have not stopped the company from dabbling its hands and working on cryptocurrencies as well as blockchain related technologies.
According to Mr. Sarkar, the company’s research and development firm, MasterCard Labs, has already filed a bunch of patents related to digital currencies and blockchain technologies.