​Mastercard Is Bringing Bitcoin Payments, In-store.

You'll soon be able to pay in-store with Bitcoin, at any retailer that accepts Mastercard online.

So, that's awesome! More use cases typically = accelerated adoption.

...but why now?

US regulators are currently on a war path with crypto, and we're still yet to shake this bear market - so why the sudden move from Mastercard?

Here's a visual explainer:

"'Improvise. Adapt. Overcome.' - Bear Grylls" - Mastercard.

That made absolutely no sense? Yep, fair play - that's our bad. We'll elaborate...

Remember this past Tuesday, when we wrote about Strike Payments allowing businesses to transact on the Bitcoin Lightning Network, in USD?

And how the transaction fees on Strike massively undercut traditional card fees?

Well, Mastercard are a big beneficiary of the $137B that merchants pay per year, in said card fees.

And while they may not be able to compete with Strike on fees - it won't matter.

Mastercard has one BIG thing, that Strike doesn't:

Infrastructure.

Specifically, Mastercard already has millions of integrated payment terminals live and in stores, around the world.

They can integrate crypto payment rails in any region, with a simple software update.

Which means they can take large swaths of marketshare, very quickly.

And they'll need to move quickly if they want to outpace their competitors.

It's great for crypto users!

...not so great for merchants.