According to Egor Pavlovich of Coin Speaker, the move came to light after a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which said that the PayPal platform “supports growth with a variety of value-added services designed to help businesses of all sizes manage their cash flow, invoice clients, pay bills, and reduce the need for merchants to receive and store sensitive customer financial information.”
PayPal decides to accept Bitcoin
Bitcoin has had its fair share of ups and downs, and is widely predicted to remain volatile despite the fact that a growing number of businesses are accepting it as currency.
“A merchant can also integrate with Braintree to begin accepting payments with credit or debit cards, PayPal, Venmo, digital currencies such as Bitcoin, or other payment solutions with a single integration,” continued the filing.
A previous announcement on the plans was made in September last year, at the same time as PayPal announced partnerships with Coinbase, BitPay and GoCoin. Merchants were able to integrate Bitcoin into their shops using customizable APIs.
At the time, Scott Ellison, PayPal’s senior director of competitive intelligence and corporate strategy said that “PayPal is playing the role of the intermediary, but the cost will be left up to the merchant and the payment processor.”
eBay spins off PayPal under pressure from Icahn
The SEC filing also stated that PayPal would separate from owner eBay Inc. at the end of this year. Under the terms of the split, PayPal cannot create a marketplace for physical goods, and eBay has assured investors that it will not build a payment processing system.
The agreement will also see approximately 80% of eBay’s gross merchandise sales pass through PayPal for the five coming years, and if this figure is not met PayPal will be due restitution. Should that figure rise above 80%, PayPal will pay eBay a commission.
Both companies will have greater flexibility after the move, which splits up two companies which merged in 2002. The merger was very successful, but the split is seen as a way to unlock shareholder value. Activist investor Carl Icahn is thought to be largely responsible for the split after he pressurized eBay into agreeing to spin off PayPal.
