Voyager Digital Ltd. ($1.9 billion) is expanding into this space as crypto investors demand digital asset payments. Today, Coinify, a crypto payment platform based in Denmark, was acquired by Voyager Digital Ltd. for $85 million.
Coinify, a crypto payments platform that allows merchants to accept digital assets and still receive traditional currencies as payouts, was established in 2014. It supports more than 20 fiat currencies. It is available in Europe as well Asia, North America, South America, and North America. It offers bill payment, which allows users to invoice customers or accept payment in cryptocurrency.
“We believe payments is the next frontier,” Stephen Ehrlich from Voyager, CEO, and Cofounder, told Forbes in an exclusive interview before the announcement.
Voyager intends to integrate its systems and Coinify’s payment platform within the following year. Customers will be able to pay directly from their digital asset accounts. This will reduce the fees associated with traditional payment infrastructures or on-chain transactions. Coinify shareholders will get 5,100,000.00 new shares of Voyager common stock and $15 million in cash as part of acquisition.
Ehrlich stated that Coinify’s acquisition was made after the Voyager team saw increasing customer demand to make and receive payments in cryptocurrency, in particular in the form of Circle’s USDC stable coin. USDC is the second-largest-stable coin worldwide by market capitalization (at $27.25 billion) and is growing faster than that industry leader tether (64.4 billion), although it has been plagued with controversy.
Ehrlich stated that “we believe that USDC stablecoins are the best stablecoins on the marketplace and that customers want to get payments in that currency.” “We see payments becoming the next frontier in trading and investing.
Voyager-Coinify is also happening as Visa and Mastercard, two of the virtual electronic payment networks in the world, are expanding their crypto businesses. Mastercard announced in July that it had simplified its process for cryptocurrency firms to offer payments cards. Visa, which is growing its crypto-linked debit card business, launched this month the first crypto rewards card in partnership with crypto firm BlockFi. In another sign of USDC’s increasing potential in payments, Visa accepted the stable coin earlier this year to settle transactions.
Ehrlich said that Coinify integration into Voyager’s systems would mean Ehrlich is focusing on growth in the coming months as the financial market continues to change. Voyager is also a public company with $200 million cash and public equity. This gives it an advantage as it continues to search the market for potential growth-oriented acquisitions.
Ehrlich said, “There are two us public today: Coinbase & us.” Let’s wait and see how they do. We have a lead over everybody in this area, and we will use that to look at more M&A deals. However, I think we also have some other advantages. We are a flexible company. Our management team has been involved in the capital markets and this industry for a long time, understanding acquisitions.
