Credit card rewards have fallen into two categories: aspirational (upgrading to a first-class flight, getting a free hotel stay) or practical (earning cash back), but now you'll be able to invest them in Bitcoin!
Visa, Mastercard and other big banks are revisiting their rewards programs to cater to younger customers who want to use their cards to build wealth or get out of debt—not just rack up perks. A new generation of credit cards are being developed to get younger users into the best performing assets of the last decade, Bitcoin. Several fintech companies this year plan to release credit cards that offer a percentage back in bitcoin on every purchase. I'd gladly sign up for this type of card, but I'd want to invest into the crypto of your choosing.
Fold
Fold currently only offers a debit card but plans to launch a credit card in the third quarter of 2021. Fold uses a lottery system, in which customers get a "spin" after every transaction for a chance to earn a certain percentage back in bitcoin. Lucky customers could get 25 percent to 100 percent back on a transaction, but the program overall averages 3 percent back.
BlockFi
Another big name in BlockFi, plans to launch a bitcoin rewards card this year. The card, which is backed by Visa, will offer a flat rate of 1.5 percent back in bitcoin on every purchase. This is more of a traditional cash back structure.
The credit card rewards market is huge at approx. $200 billion dollars globally. If crypto could take a percentage of that it would amazing since theres only a limited amount of Bitcoin to ever to be minted. It would also turn Bitcoin into savings device,
which is the appropriate way to treat it. Users will buy good and hold Bitcoin since it's not a great payment coin.
All I know is all this talk about integrating crypto with mainstream financial networks makes me bullish. We're kind of entering a new phase in terms of mainstream acceptability and having a way to breakdown the barriers to entry for the crypto curious is the next major move.