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A Bank In Argentina Is Now Using Bitcoin for Cross-Border Payments

Cryptocurrency trading startup Bitex has trialed a cross-border payments system using bitcoin with an Argentinian bank.

Argentina

Argentina's Banco Masventas has revealed that starting Monday it will enable customers to send cross-border payments using bitcoin.

A partnership with Latin America-focused exchange startup Bitex, founded in 2014, the newshttps://www.bancomasventas.com.ar/bitex-principal finds the regional bank using bitcoin as a payments rail in international transactions as an alternative to Swift.

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Bitex chief marking officer Manuel Beaudroit told CoinDesk that the startup believes this marks the first time that a domestic bank has adopted bitcoin for cross-border payments.

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In statements, Jose Dakak, principal shareholder of Masventas, credited the move to a broader drive by the bank to enhance its digital, smartphone-based services, as well as to lower the bank's cost of service.

"One of the actions was to contract Bitex as a strategic partner in the implementation of the Bitex platform for payments and collections operations for our clients abroad," he said.

While no real-world transactions have been launched yet (the service began today), the bank will soon use bitcoin for real customer transactions, Beaudroit said.

He told CoinDesk:

"The customers will ask the bank to do an international payment, and the bank uses Bitex as a provider. For the customer, it's transparent, they don't touch, they don't see the bitcoin. We are a provider for them, and they are not touching bitcoin."

Argentina flag image via Shutterstock

Nikhilesh De

Nikhilesh De is CoinDesk's managing editor for global policy and regulation, covering regulators, lawmakers and institutions. When he's not reporting on digital assets and policy, he can be found admiring Amtrak or building LEGO trains. He owns < $50 in BTC and < $20 in ETH. He was named the Association of Cryptocurrency Journalists and Researchers' Journalist of the Year in 2020.

Nikhilesh De