Major cryptocurrency exchange Binance announced in a blog post on Nov. 28 that it partnered with crypto travel startup TravelByBit to launch a rewards card that facilitates crypto payments on major travel websites. Per the announcement, the card will function like a traditional prepaid card with access to additional discounts and rewards that users will be able to load with Bitcoin (BTC), Binance USD (BUSD), Binance Coin (BNB) and Ontology (ONT). The card will be released early next year and will initially target travelers in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, Australia and Europe, with plans to gradually expand. Traveling …

China’s digital currency approach will be favoring international payments and domestic retail system, a former senior official said. Zhou Xiaochuan, the president of the Chinese Finance Association and former governor of the People’s Bank of China (PBoC), outlined two types of implementations of central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) speaking at the 2019 Caixin Hengqin Forum, local publication Caixin reports Nov. 26. The first type is an electronic payment-oriented domestic retail system, while the second is international remittances for settlements between financial institutions. China will continue to focus on digital yuan, Zhou says Zhou — the longest-serving head of PBoC and …

European Central Bank (ECB) board member Benoit Coeure has warned that global stablecoins remain untested and raise potential risks across multiple policy domains. Coeure, a member of the ECB’s Executive Board, made his remarks at the Joint Conference of the ECB and National Bank of Belgium on Nov. 26, in a speech entitled "Crossing the chasm to the retail payments of tomorrow." Global stablecoins pose broad policy risks Coeure’s speech was focused on the failure to establish a pan-European, market-led solution for digital retail payments. Notwithstanding progress with back-end initiatives like SEPA and the TARGET Instant Payment Settlement (TIPS) system, …

Travala, a service that allows its users to pay for hotel stays with cryptocurrency, will now let its customers reserve any hotel that is bookable through Booking.com. Travala announced in a press release on Nov. 25 that it has already integrated Booking’s accommodations to its platform. The new feature will purportedly allow users to book 90,000 different destinations using cryptocurrencies. Pay for your stay with crypto Travala’s customers can pay with its proprietary AVA token and 20 major crypto assets including Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH), Dash (DASH), Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Litecoin (LTC), EOS, Stellar (XLM), Cardano (ADA), Binance Chain (BNB), …

The first deputy governor of the French central bank has called for distributed ledger technology (DLT)-based settlements and payment systems in Europe. Speaking at the AFME Annual Capital Markets Technology and Innovation Conference on Nov. 21, Denis Beau, the first deputy governor of Banque de France, delved into the issue of policy frameworks that could potentially help to bring innovation and growth into Europe’s capital markets. An important impact on the financial industry Beau suggested that the implementation of blockchain-based solutions could have an impact on the financial industry, stating: “The tokenisation of financial assets combined with the recourse to …

The number of Ether (ETH) locked in decentralized finance (DeFi) applications reached an all-time high of 2.7 million, according to DeFi monitoring resource DeFiPulse, and has been steadily growing since the end of June. Of the 2.7 million ETH locked, 2.1 million (77%) are locked in the system behind the DAI stablecoin, Maker. Additionally, 337,800 ETH (12.5%) are currently locked in the decentralized lending application Compound. The remaining Ether is split between minor DeFi applications including decentralized exchanges and financial derivatives. Ether locked in DeFi applications. Source: DeFiPulse DeFi grows despite market conditions The one-year chart of the dollar value …

Alibaba Group’s movie-making arm Alibaba Pictures reportedly plans to tokenize distribution rights for its new film "Striding into the Wind,” Chinese English-language publication China.org.cn reports on Nov. 22. The company has purportedly signed an agreement with New York-based decentralized entertainment platform Breaker, formerly known as SingularDTV, to distribute the film overseas using its blockchain platform. Li Jie, senior vice president of Alibaba Pictures and CEO of Alibaba's ticketing app Taopiaopiao, reportedly announced the news during the China Golden Rooster & Hundred Flowers Film Festival on Nov. 20. New film will be released on SingularDTV's Ethereum-based EtherVision The executive noted that …

CEO of blockchain firm R3 has ridiculed the way Facebook introduced its yet-to-be-released Libra stablecoin. Skepticism surrounding Facebook’s forthcoming Libra stablecoin continues growing as David Rutter, the CEO of enterprise software firm R3, said that the announcement of Libra this summer was “ridiculously stupid,” Financial News reported on Nov. 18. “Really naïve” Rutter delivered comments during a recent company conference in London, admitting that Facebook’s plans to issue their own cryptocurrency made policy makers and financial regulators have sped up the process of examination of blockchain and cryptocurrency applications. However, Rutter added that Facebook’s ambition to enter the financial systems …

The United States Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is exploring the idea of a blockchain-based property registry to streamline disaster insurance payouts. In its latest National Advisory Draft Report to the FEMA Administrator, the agency indicated its interest in deploying blockchain technology in order to streamline disaster insurance payouts and improve the speed of disaster responses. To achieve this, FEMA recommended the establishment of a blockchain-based property and land registry, containing all critical information needed to file an insurance or disaster assistance claim. Cutting the rate of self-insurance for public infrastructure FEMA suggested that such a registry would not only …

Decentralized payment processing company Radpay has secured $1.2 million in a seed round, with the participation of investment firms Resiliency Ventures and BlackLaunch. Per a press release published on Nov. 18, Radpay completed a $1.2 million series seed round that reflects a 20% oversubscription. The company saw financial support from a number of Silicon Valley investors, Phoenix-based investment firms Resiliency Ventures and BlackLaunch, and investors from Nebraska and Arizona. Radpay is planning to allocate the raised funds to the company’s further development, which includes commercialization of its technology, expansion of its products to e-commerce and retailers, as well as the …

International payment network Visa is working on a blockchain-based system for joint policy-compliant computation of large-scale private data. Visa Research — the research and development arm of Visa that focuses on data analytics, security and payment innovation — released a paper describing a blockchain-powered system for policy-compliant computing. The system is dubbed LucidiTEE, where TEE stands for trusted execution environments. Joint processing of large data sets with higher transparency The system is aimed at building applications that process large data sets and are intended for serving a large number of users, without knowing in advance what users would participate and …

Lagos-headquartered fintech Opay has sealed $120 million in a series B financing round from a host of high-profile Chinese investors. Founded in 2018 by web browser developer Opera, OPay — which focuses on developing digital payments solutions to promote financial inclusion — had previously raised $50 million in June of this year, according to what Opera’s spokesperson told Cointelegraph. Opay to extend payments solution across Africa According to a Nov. 18 report from TechCrunch, Opera’s OPay reportedly intends to use the new Series B $120 million round to scale and extend its digital payments solution beyond Nigeria to Kenya, Ghana …