To witness confusion and then clarity is an unforgettable experience. Recently, we witnessed this experience between Binance and Alipay. As Binance launched its P2P trading, it supported Alipay, WeChat, and bank transfer.

Basically, through the P2P trading platform, you can directly buy and sell crypto. This news, however, was wrongly reported by media outlets. Many thought Binance officially supported payment giants like Alipay and WeChat.

When user Haiyi asked if fiat deposits are supported, CEO of Binance Changpeng Zhao confirmed with an YES on Twitter:

As the news went viral, Alipay responded with a short tweet: No, you cannot.



What does this mean? On one side, you see Binance saying YES to Alipay payment for OTC and P2P trading. Then, on the other, Alipay clarified such activities are not encouraged.

In fact, the mobile payment giant went onto explain how they closely monitor bitcoin-related transactions:

There’re several reports about Alipay being used for bitcoin transactions. To reiterate, Alipay closely monitors over-the-counter transactions to identify irregular behavior and ensure compliance with relevant regulations.

Alipay further added:

If any transactions are identified as being related to bitcoin or other virtual currencies, Alipay immediately stops the relevant payment services.

In India, Alibaba-backed PayTM has carried out similar activities — temporarily banning account of users using P2P trading platform.

We are still waiting to hear from Binance.

Alipay also updated its Weibo account signaling users are “forbidden to use Alipay for cryptocurrency transactions.”

After taking over PayPal in 2013, Alipay turned into a mobile payment giant with over a billion registered users.

Source: Twitter [1, 2]