Bitso is now offering the Circle-issued, euro-denominated Euro Coin (EUROC) to its customers and clients as a payments option.
The Latin American crypto-powered financial services company has made the global FinTech company’s euro-backed stablecoin available to its 6 million users, becoming the first company in the region to offer it, Circle said in a Thursday (Jan. 12) press release.
“We add useful and innovative assets to our platform to continually expand use cases for our users that solve the needs of our region,” Bitso Crypto Strategy Leader Andrés Salcedo said in the release. “We are confident that including Euro Coin into our portfolio will help us leverage the usage of stablecoins across the region, promote international transfers with transactions in euros and will allow people and companies to prosper in a global digital economy.”
Cryptocurrency is gaining popularity in Brazil, for example, with citizens of the country purchasing it as an alternative investment option to protect their assets from economic instability, to diversify their financial portfolios or to protect themselves from government intervention. Twelve percent of Brazilians said they wished to use crypto for money transfers or payments.
Brazil has become a leader in digital banking and digital payments adoption, according to the “Digitizing Payments in Latin America Playbook,” a PYMNTS and Kushki collaboration.
Circle launched Euro Coin in June 2022, adding it to the dollar-pegged USD Coin (USDC) stablecoin it also issues.
As PYMNTS reported at the time, a euro-denominated stablecoin makes it far easier for European Union (EU) citizens to move liquidity on-chain and can be used in the crypto trading world.
Circle said in the press release that Bitso’s offering of Euro Coin would benefit both the senders and the recipients in transactions involving the 4.6 million Latin Americans living in Europe or the trade between countries in the two regions.
“Adding Euro Coin brings everyday utility value for Bitso’s growing list of customers and clients that have a desire to transact with a fully-reserved, euro-denominated digital currency,” Circle Vice President of Product Joao Reginatto said in the release. “We are excited to see the expansion of EUROC into the Latin American market and support Bitso’s mission of bringing borderless access to money for its users.”
