Bitpay

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Bitpay

logo
legal form Inc.
founding May 2011
Seat Atlanta
management CEO: Stephen Pair, CCO: Sonny Singh, CFO: Glen Braganza
Branch Payment services with cryptocurrencies
Website https://bitpay.com/

Bitpay is on crypto currencies specialized payment services provider based in Atlanta , USA.

history

Bitpay was founded in May 2011 by Tony Gallippi and Stephen Pair in Orlando to enable companies to conduct business with cryptocurrencies. In October 2012, Bitpay had 1,100 active business customers.

In early 2013, Bitpay announced that it was moving its headquarters from Orlando to Atlanta . Bitpay had previously raised USD 510,000 from investors. Atlanta was chosen as the new headquarters because the capital of the state of Georgia with its many fintech companies is a more attractive location than Orlando in Florida.

In September 2013, Bitpay served 10,000 active business customers. According to Bitpay, the company had processed transactions totaling USD 34 million at the time. At the time, this was equivalent to around 280,000 Bitcoin.

In May 2014, Bitpay raised over USD 30 million from risk investors.

In December 2014, a hacker gained access to the email account of the then Bitpay CFO Bryan Krohn. The hacker was able to arrange for the transfer of 5,000 Bitcoin to his own wallet. The loot had a market value of USD 1.8 million at the time of the crime.

functionality

Bitpay is not an exchange for trading cryptocurrencies like Bitstamp . Instead, Bitpay enables companies to accept cryptocurrencies for goods and services. Non-profit foundations can also receive donations via Bitpay. Bitpay ensures that a customer or donor transfers a corresponding amount of crypto currencies to Bitpay as trustee for a specified amount of money. Bitpay then exchanges the crypto currency for fiat currency in order to transfer the customer a corresponding amount of money. Bitpay currently offers the cryptocurrencies Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash . The transaction fee is one percent of the purchase price or the donation amount.

Since May 2016, Bitpay has been offering end customers in cooperation with Visa credit cards that can be topped up with cryptocurrencies . Credit cards are available in all 50 states and outside of the United States. During the payment process, the crypto currency is converted into fiat currency according to the current average rate. When Visa terminated its cooperation with the fintech payment service provider WaveCrest in January 2018 , many customers could no longer use their crypto credit cards. Affected were customers of TenX and Xapo as well as Bitpay users whose credit cards were issued in Europe. US customers were not affected.

regulation

In the United States, Bitpay is state-registered with the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FCEN) of the US Department of Finance. Bitpay is therefore obliged, depending on the legal situation of the respective state, to store information about the identity and transactions of its customers. If there is a suspicion of money laundering, Bitpay is obliged to report to the FCEN.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ BitPay CrunchBase Profile . Crunchbase.com. Retrieved January 17, 2014.
  2. ↑ 3 Years in, Bitcoin Digital Money Gains Momentum . Scientific American. October 8, 2012.
  3. ↑ Tony Gallispi: Bitcoin payments processor, BitPay Relos HQ to Atlanta and plans software center . Biz journals. January 7, 2013. Accessed October 21, 2018.
  4. ↑ BitPay Passes 10,000 Bitcoin-Accepting Merchants On Its Payment Processing Network . September 16, 2016. Retrieved October 22, 2018.
  5. ↑ Seth Fiegerman: BitPay Now Top-Funded Bitcoin Startup After Raising $ 30 Million. In: Mashable. May 13, 2014, accessed on August 16, 2019 .
  6. ↑ David Allison: Atlanta's Bitpay got hacked for $ 1.8 million in bitcoin - Atlanta Business Chronicle . In: Atlanta Business Chronicle . September 16, 2015. Accessed October 21, 2018.
  7. ↑ Frequently Asked Questions. In: Bitpay. Retrieved on August 16, 2019 .
  8. ↑ BitPay rolls out prepaid bitcoin Visa debit card in 131 countries . May 24, 2017. Retrieved October 22, 2018.
  9. ↑ Mirko Dölle: Visa blocks hundreds of thousands of Bitcoin credit cards. In: Heise Online. January 5, 2018, accessed August 16, 2019 .
  10. ^ Terms of Use. In: Bitpay. Retrieved on August 16, 2019 .