PayPal (NASDAQ:) Holdings, Inc. (PYPL) announced it is enabling its U.S. merchants to buy, hold and sell cryptocurrency directly from their PayPal business account. At launch, this functionality for Business Accounts will not be available in New York State. Today’s announcement is PayPal‘s latest step to increase cryptocurrency‘s utility by making increased functionality available to millions of merchants in the U.S.

“Since we launched the ability for PayPal and Venmo consumers to buy, sell, and hold cryptocurrency in their wallets, we have learned a lot about how they want to use their cryptocurrency,” said Jose Fernandez da Ponte, Senior Vice President of Blockchain, Cryptocurrency, and Digital Currencies, PayPal. “Business owners have increasingly expressed a desire for the same cryptocurrency capabilities available to consumers. We’re excited to meet that demand by delivering this new offering, empowering them to engage with digital currencies effortlessly.”

Additionally, PayPal is enabling U.S. merchants to externally transfer cryptocurrency on chain to third-party eligible wallets. PayPal business account holders can now send and receive supported cryptocurrency tokens to and from external blockchain addresses.

PayPal has continuously made significant steps to increase cryptocurrency‘s utilization. In 2020, PayPal announced the availability of its customers to buy, hold and sell cryptocurrency directly from their PayPal and Venmo accounts. In 2023, PayPal announced the launch of a U.S. dollar-denominated stablecoin, PayPal USD (PYUSD). In April 2024, we enabled PYUSD as a funding instrument for our Xoom platform, allowing users to pay no transaction fees when using PYUSD to fund eligible transfers to friends and family abroad. Most recently, PYUSD was made available on the Solana blockchain, providing users with the choice of multiple blockchains allowing for increased flexibility and control.