Huobi and Solaris introduce Visa-backed debit card in the EU

Visa has joined forces with Huobi and Solaris to allow European users to pay for transactions from their cryptocurrency account using a Visa-backed debit card.

With the emergence of Blockchain technology, providing different payment options that accommodate both traditional and digital currencies has become a priority for many financial institutions. To stay ahead in this arena, Visa–a reliable pioneer within the digital payments industry–has also adopted this ambition.

More details about the Visa-backed debit card

Recently, Crypto exchange Huobi announced a groundbreaking partnership with Solaris, one of Europe’s premier financial service providers. This collaboration will allow users to transact digital currencies into traditional fiat currency through Visa-powered debit cards – an unparalleled convenience for crypto traders worldwide.

Citizens within the European Economic Area (EEA) will be able to take advantage of our debit card service starting in the second quarter of 2023. To clarify, the EEA encompasses all countries that are members of the EU.

Andrea Ramiono, Solaris’ chief strategy officer, expressed his enthusiasm concerning the collaboration and suggested that this is only the first step in what may come of it. Also, this signalizes a breakthrough in Huobi’s mission to bring virtual assets within reach for all who strive to access them.

Huobi isn’t the only Visa-backed crypto card in Europe – Binance launched its version last year! Moreover, Visa has highly supported digital currency initiatives and has even initiated several projects to bridge the gap between crypto and fiat currencies. As part of this effort, they recently collaborated with Blockchain.com to introduce a cryptocurrency debit card available for US residents on October 22 last year.

Visa also teamed up with ZELF, a fintech company, to launch an anonymous debit card that can be directly linked to crypto wallets like Huobi. With this innovative debit card, users only need their name, email address, and phone number to open up a USD-based checking account.

Visa proposes a self-custodial wallet that allows customers to make automated payments in cryptocurrency securely

On December 20, 2022, Visa announced a revolutionary crypto solution in its blog post. This project could allow service providers to effectively and securely withdraw funds from Ethereum wallets without requiring individual authorization for every transaction – similar to how the traditional banking industry allows auto-billing for subscriptions like Netflix. With this cutting-edge approach, customers will no longer have to approve each payment made through their wallet manually.

Visa recently revealed a new self-custodial wallet called “delegable accounts,” enabling users to schedule automated recurring payments in crypto. This revolutionary technology is based on the Account Abstraction (AA) concept, allowing customers to set up programmable payment instructions for transferring funds from their wallets at any given interval.

With the help of AA-based self-custody wallets, users can access their accounts to manage multiple transactions autonomously. For instance, individuals can set up smart contracts, so they don’t have to request authorization for every transaction.

In 2015, Ethereum’s co-creator Vitalik Buterin proposed this concept to unite ETH wallets and smart contracts in one account. Previous iterations of the same idea had been put forward as part of various “Ethereum Improvement Proposals” but failed due to technical challenges like protocol modification requirements and security assurances.

The Visa team has declared that it is simpler to join the auto-payment system through wallets operated by third parties such as crypto exchanges. Unfortunately, entrusting funds with a third party carries considerable risks due to cases like bankrupt exchange FTX and others.

The Visa team revealed that the delegable accounts experiments on a private blockchain from StarkNet, an off-chain scaling solution, were prosperous. With the success rate of their previous crypto payment projects, we can solely anticipate further developments in the days to come.