News PayPal: We’ll ‘Definitely Support’ Bitcoin If It Becomes ‘Better Currency’

The CFO of PayPal defended the case for fiat merchant settlements Monday, telling mainstream media the company could nonetheless “definitely support” Bitcoin in the future.

CFO Rainey Points Finger at Volatility

Speaking to CNBC in an edition of the network’s Mad Money segment, John Rainey, PayPal’s CFO, claimed that volatility was the reason PayPal did not “see a lot of interest” from its merchants regarding cryptocurrency acceptance.

Rainey told Mad Money host Jim Cramer:

Because of the volatility of the cryptocurrencies, if you’re a merchant and you have, let’s say, a 10 percent margin on a product that you sell and you accept Bitcoin, for example, and the very next day it moves 15 percent, you’re now underwater on that transaction.

Lightning Network to Beat Processors on Fees

The perspective comes as little surprise from PayPal, as the company toyed with Bitcoin acceptance via its Braintree integrated payments solution since 2015.

Since that time, Bitcoin volatility has curbed considerably, while merchant practices of instantly converting funds to fiat – a practice Rainey also highlights – could also soon change.

As Bitcoinist reported this week, advances in Bitcoin’s currency capabilities in the form of the Lightning Network continue to pressure both merchant processors and fiat-based solutions with conspicuously lower fees and near-instant transaction processing times.

Braintree, which charges on average 2.9% plus a $0.30 flat fee per transaction, became the subject of a direct comparison to Bitcoin payments via Lightning-enabled payment tools, which incur zero costs to the merchant.

Lightning remains in its infancy, with a total network capacity of just under $170,000.

Rainey meanwhile signaled that PayPal was not about to give up on Bitcoin. He added:

Right now, we don’t see a lot of interest from our merchants. But if it’s something that stabilizes in the future and is a better currency, then we’ll certainly support that.

What do you think about PayPal’s future relationship with Bitcoin? Let us know in the comments section below!

Images courtesy of Vimeo/@CNBC and Shutterstock.