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Coinbase says its retail payments platform has now processed $200 million worth of Bitcoin (BTC) and crypto transactions since it launched in February of 2018.
Coinbase Commerce allows merchants to accept payments in different cryptocurrencies, including BTC, Bitcoin Cash (BCH) and Ethereum (ETH) without fees. The platform hit the crypto payment milestone on Thursday, reports CoinDesk.
Commerce product lead John Zettler says crypto payments appear to be undeterred by the pandemic-induced economic downturn. He says that the platform has not seen any significant changes in activity this month, as both cryptocurrency and traditional markets plummeted.
Zettler says that consumers prefer to use Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency by market cap, although he also observes that consumers are starting to use stablecoins, especially USD Coin (USDC), a cryptocurrency collaboration between Coinbase and Circle that is backed by the US dollar.
Stablecoins are designed to be far less volatile than other cryptocurrencies since their value is pegged to a stable asset.
Zettler says he expects stablecoin transactions to ramp up in the second and third quarters.
“Merchant customers often tell us it’s the crypto they’re most familiar with and the one they trust the most.”
More than 8,000 merchants currently use Coinbase Commerce to accept payments in cryptocurrency.