As the lines between traditional finance and blockchain continue to blur a little more each day, Mastercard is reportedly in talks to acquire Zerohash, a startup that provides crypto infrastructure, with a particular focus on stablecoins.
Mastercard is reportedly in talks to acquire Zerohash
For several years now, Mastercard’s involvement in the crypto landscape has been well established.
According to Fortune Crypto, the global payments giant is poised to make another move by acquiring the crypto startup Zerohash. In fact, according to five anonymous sources familiar with the matter, negotiations are reportedly centered on a deal valued between $1.5 billion and $2 billion.
More specifically, Zerohash provides various infrastructure solutions for stablecoins, on-ramps and off-ramps, cross-border payments, tokenization, and staking.
In September, the company had already made headlines through a partnership with Morgan Stanley to provide technology for the bank’s E*Trade platform, enabling trading of BTC, ETH, and SOL.
Earlier this month, we reported on ongoing discussions regarding the stablecoin startup BVNK. In fact, both Coinbase and Mastercard were in the running for a potential acquisition, and according to Fortune Crypto, Coinbase reportedly won out in the negotiations.
This could explain Mastercard’s shift toward Zerohash, although the deal may not go through.
Earlier this year, Zerohash was also involved in a Mastercard initiative, when Mastercard enabled its cardholders to make on-chain payments through a partnership with Chainlink (LINK). In this project, Zerohash is responsible for asset conversion and custody.
Yesterday, we looked back at an initiative by competitor Visa, whose new product highlights payments using four stablecoins.
