Cryptocurrency and stablecoin rewards are gaining popularity |

• Key insights: Cryptocurrency and stablecoin rewards are gaining popularity following the passage of the GENIUS Act.
• What’s at stake: As traditional, premium credit card rewards are being revamped by American Express and JPMorganChase, other payments companies are hoping to offer a different value proposition to borrowers through digital assets. 
• Forward look: Fold, a Bitcoin financial services company, wants to integrate bitcoin into consumers’ entire financial lives, Chairman, CEO and Founder Will Reeves told American Banker. 

A more crypto-friendly government is driving wider  uses for digital assets, and that includes incentive marketing. 

Fold, a publicly traded Bitcoin financial services company founded in 2019, late last month said it was partnering with Visa and Stripe to start offering a credit card that pays up to 3.5% in Bitcoin rewards on purchases. Cardholders earn an unlimited 2% back instantly, plus up to 1.5% back when they pay off purchases using their Fold checking account, according to Fold. Stripe will issue the card, and Visa will serve as the network. 

The card had about 75,000 consumers on its waitlist at launch. 

“The Stripe announcement signals a level of adoption and open embrace of Bitcoin in a way that I would say wasn’t around back in 2019,” Fold Chairman, CEO and Founder Will Reeves told American Banker. 

Credit cards that pay rewards in cryptocurrencies are nothing new, but they are gaining popularity. PayPal-owned Venmo first began allowing consumers to automatically purchase crypto with the cash back they received on purchases in 2021, and cryptocurrency exchange Gemini launched a co-branded Mastercard to provide crypto rewards linked to spend on its credit card in 2022. American Express and Coinbase also teamed up in June of this year to launch a co-branded credit card with crypto rewards. 

More credit cards offering rewards paid out in cryptocurrency are also on the horizon, a trend that is gaining more momentum as some of the countries largest credit card issuers such as American Express and JPMorganChase revamp their premium, flagship credit card rewards offerings. 

The rewards are paid out like any other credit card with a cash-back reward, Reeves said. The customer swipes their card, Visa recognizes the transaction on the Visa network and remits interchange to Fold, which Fold then uses to purchase Bitcoin from the open market or from its roughly $160 billion of Bitcoin reserves on its balance sheet before turning over the Bitcoin to the customer. 

“The customer is now fully exposed to the volatility of Bitcoin,” Reeves said. Afterward, customers can convert the Bitcoin back to dollars or withdraw it to another Bitcoin wallet.

In the Fold

For Fold, offering Bitcoin as a reward on credit card spend is about more than just swapping the reward, it changes the underlying business model of rewards programs, Reeves said. 

“Its a phase shift,” Reeves said. “At the bedrock of rewards programs are two concepts:…