coincodex.com
Key highlights:
- A report from City A.M. cites and unnamed "insider" as saying that Amazon is working on accepting cryptocurrency payments
- Per the publication's source, the E-commerce giant is also considering creating its own native token
- The report is unconfirmed, but seems to have had a positive impact on crypto market sentiment
Unconfirmed report says Amazon is looking to accept crypto
The cryptocurrency community today is buzzing about a report from U.K. publication City A.M., which citest an unnamed “insider” as saying that E-commerce giant Amazon is preparing to accept cryptocurrency payments, and even has plans to launch their own token.
According to the source, Amazon is planning to first start accepting Bitcoin by the end of 2021, and later expand support to Ethereum, Cardano, Bitcoin Cash and other popular crypto assets. The source told City A.M. that Amazon’s ambitions with cryptocurrency are significant, and that they have been working on their plans with cryptocurrency since 2019:
“This isn’t just going through the motions to set up cryptocurrency payment solutions at some point in the future – this is a full-on, well-discussed, integral part of the future mechanism of how Amazon will work.”
The source said that Amazon is also considering a “native token” that would be used as a reward in a “loyalty scheme”.
While the report remains unconfirmed, a recent job posting by Amazon does give the rumors some degree of credibility. The company is currently looking to hire a Digital Currency and Blockchain Product Lead, which will be responsible for developing Amazon’s strategy and product roudmap for digital currencies and blockchain technology. One of the listed requirements for the job is that the candidate needs to have a “deep understanding of the digital/cryptocurrency ecosystem”.
Amazon has a market capitalization of 1.85 trillion, so the company adopting cryptocurrencies would likely be a massive boost for the cryptocurrency sector – for example, PayPal’s adoption of cryptocurrency last year was received extremely positively by the crypto community and arguably helped kickstart the 2020-2021 bull run. The cryptocurrency market has been performing very well today, and the report about Amazon’s cryptocurrency plans could have played a role in improving market sentiment.
Bitcoin increased by over 12% in the last hours, and is trading above $38,000 for the first time since mid-June.