Barclays becomes the first major UK bank to enter into a partnership with a digital currency firm social payments app called Circle, that uses Bitcoin technology to move money between different currencies, according to Reuters.
Unlike a traditional money transfer company, however, Circle offers its users the opportunity to send not just written messages along with their money transfers, but also emojis and even animated “GIF” videos, with no charge, following in the footsteps of China’s WeChat Pay and AliPay.
“The founding vision for Sean and I was that money should work the way the internet works,” said Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire, who founded the company with fellow internet entrepreneur Sean Neville.
“This is the thing that I think we’re all learning from the Chinese: that this merging of messenging, media and payments together really makes sense to people.”
“The founding vision for Sean and I was that money should work the way the internet works,” said Circle CEO Jeremy Allaire, who founded the company along with Sean Neville. “This is the thing that I think we’re all learning from the Chinese: that this merging of messaging, media and payments together really makes sense to people.”
The Circle app launched in the UK on Wednesday after being granted an e-money license by UK watchdog the Financial Conduct Authority. The decision marks another first for a digital currency company.
Circle is a Boston-based startup backed by $76 million in venture capital by a few well-known financial institutions like Goldman Sachs, Breyer Capital, Oak Investment Partners, Accel Partners and General Catalyst. The company is expected to expand to further expand its services to cover the rest of Europe, South America, and Asia. As the blockchain gains more acceptance among the banks, we can expect the number of companies offering blockchain based services to increase, connecting the whole world to one decentralized database
