Visa (NYSE:V) announced on Wednesday it has formed a new partnership with First Boulevard, a digitally native neobank that is focused on building generational wealth for the Black community, to expand its digital currency roadmap. Visa reported First Boulevard will be the first to pilot Visa’s new suite of crypto APIs, which will enable their customers to purchase, custody and trade digital assets held by Anchorage, a federally chartered digital asset bank.
“The development of Visa’s crypto APIs marks the next phase of Visa’s digital currency strategy—focused on expanding the company’s role as a network-of-networks. As part of this initial test and learn phase, Visa will explore ways in which financial institutions lacking their own digital currency infrastructure can harness Visa’s platform for tapping into the growing world of crypto assets and blockchain networks.”
While sharing more details about the partnership and crypto API suite, Jack Forestell, Chief Product Officer of Visa, stated:
“We set out to make Visa the bridge between digital currencies and our global network of 70 million merchants and today we are the leading network for crypto wallets with 35 crypto platforms choosing to issue with Visa. With this pilot program, we want to extend the value of Visa to our neobank and financial institution clients by providing an easy bridge to crypto assets and blockchain networks.”
As part of the initial pilot program, Visa added it plans to enable First Boulevard to connect to the infrastructure provided by Visa’s partner, Anchorage, a federally chartered digital asset bank, to allow their customers to buy and sell Bitcoin.
