Over 40% of Tangem Pay transactions originate in Latin America and upwards of 30% come from the United States, even though physical card distribution is still limited in certain regions, the Swiss hardware wallet firm informed Cointelegraph.
“It is not simply a question of where people want crypto cards,” Andrey Ilinskiy, head of Tangem Pay, remarked to Cointelegraph, further stating: “It is where demand, regulation, banking infrastructure and card-issuing requirements happen to line up — and today, those maps do not always overlap.”
On Wednesday, Tangem revealed its inaugural physical Visa card designed for online and physical retail transactions as well as ATM cash withdrawals, with an initial rollout capped at 5,000 cards.
The business explained that customers can load the card straight from their non-custodial wallet and transfer balances back to the wallet if the card gets frozen or terminated.
“Self-custody removes one major boundary: there is no custodian standing between the user and their assets. But when those assets enter a regulated payment network, another set of boundaries appears,” Tangem stated.
Tangem unable to ship its card to roughly 20 nations
Tangem noted that it currently cannot ship physical Tangem Pay cards to approximately 20 nations, which include Russia, China, North Korea, and Palestine.
The limitations do not automatically match the regulations impacting cryptocurrencies themselves, the organization pointed out. Sanctions, Know Your Customer (KYC) mandates, domestic banking regulations, and card-issuing compliance all play a role in defining where a crypto-connected card can be accessed.
“The same conditions that can create demand for crypto as an alternative financial rail can make regulated card issuance more difficult,” Tangem observed.
Related: US stablecoin adoption could surge with bank-like protections: Visa survey
Tangem is additionally rolling out cashback rewards paid in Circle’s USDC stablecoin, offering 1% for Basic members and 2% for Plus members on qualified transactions.
The enterprise intends to display the premier physical Tangem Pay cards at Token2049 located in Singapore.
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Originally published at https://cointelegraph.com/news/crypto-card-access-doesnt-match-global-demand-tangem-says?utm_source=rss_feed&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=rss_partner_inbound.
