Multinational payment giant Stripe has announced that it is looking to hire engineers and designers for its new crypto team. The company, however, is not new to crypto. In 2014, Stripe became the first major payments company to support Bitcoin payments. But in 2018, the company shut down Bitcoin support due to high transaction fees and high processing times.
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Stripe follows a growing number of fintech firms, like Square and PayPal, treading the crypto path.
Stripe New Crypto Team
In a Twitter post, the Head of crypto engineering at Stripe, Guillaume Poncin, announced the search on Tuesday.
We’re starting a new crypto team at @Stripe. I’m hiring engineers and designers to build the future of Web3 payments: https://t.co/A40QPCw3XG. pic.twitter.com/ygYTrA125T
— Guillaume Poncin (@gponcin) October 12, 2021
The company is looking for four engineers across its U.S. offices to build its crypto team. According to the job postings, the staff engineers “will design and build the core components that we need to support crypto use cases.”
“As the usage of cryptocurrency grows worldwide, it opens up new exciting avenues for businesses and individuals to transact and create value. We hear a growing need from developers and users in that space for better building blocks to accept payments, move funds, exchange between fiat and crypto, etc. By focusing on these problems and needs, we aim to build faster, more trustworthy, and higher quality crypto-enabled experiences.”
Stripe Co-founder John Collison also quoted Poncin’s Twitter post about the new crypto team.
Stripe and crypto have grown up at the same time; we started writing code the year after the Bitcoin paper dropped. We’ve always kept an eye on things (e.g. bitcoin support 2013-2015) but last few years’ developments (L2s, new chains, stablecoins, DeFi) are particularly exciting. https://t.co/Jr1yyA37Wg
— John Collison (@collision) October 12, 2021
The posts, however, do not mention which cryptocurrencies Stripe plans to integrate.
FinTechs Jumping On The Crypto Bandwagon
Although Stripe’s crypto team may be new, the company itself has dabbled in crypto years ago. Back in 2014 when the company integrated Bitcoin, it made headlines. Stripe said: “…we can already start to see the shape of the potential impact of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. If we get things right, life is going to be much better for billions of people.”
Total crypto market at $2.329 Trillion | Source: Crypto Total Market Cap from TradingView.com
However, that optimism did not last. The payment giant had to abandon the service four years later. “Bitcoin has evolved to become better-suited to being an asset than being a means of exchange.” wrote Tom Karlo, former product manager of the Global Payment Methods team. He also stated that the rise in transaction confirmation times, as well as increased transaction fees, led to the decision to end Bitcoin support.
Related Reading | Stripe Co-Founder Excited by ‘Payments Use Cases of Crypto’
Even after this incident, Stripe co-founder John Collison stated that they are still “extraordinarily enthusiastic Bitcoin fans.” He said this in a discussion with Bloomberg in June.
Bitcoin has since seen more institutional adoption and individual investors buying in. Stripe’s move to accept crypto payments comes after major competitors, including Square, Paypal, and Mastercard, have boarded the crypto train. Square launched Bitcoin trading via its Cash App in 2018. Also in August, Jack Dorsey, Square CEO, revealed plans for a Bitcoin-centric Decentralized Exchange (DEX).
Related Reading | PayPal, Square, Others Crucial In Driving Bitcoin 70% Higher in a Month
Last year, Paypal launched crypto support for U.S. customers. Similarly, Mastercard announced in February that it was bringing crypto onto its network.
Featured image by Stripe, Chart from TradingView.com