Mercado Libre’s financial wallet arm called Mercado Pago recently announced that it was rolling out crypto trading services in Mexico.
The e-tail giant in Latin America is already offering similar services in Brazil and is catering to more than one million customers.
These people are able to buy, sell and hold bitcoin and ethereum and can also receive Mercadocoin, which is the token that Mercado Libre launched itself.
Crypto services
Mercado Pago wants to establish its services in Mexico and has decided to offer crypto trading in order to achieve this goal.
Functioning as the wallet arm of Mercado Libre, the company announced on September 27th that it would now provide customers in Mexico the ability to use their national fiat currency to buy crypto.
This would mean that every customer in Mexico would now be able to use the funds that are available in their native wallet of Mercado Pago to purchase Bitcoin and Ether.
The company has decided to roll out these services in Mexico because it wants to provide its already existing clientele with more options.
The chief executive of Mercado Pago in Mexico, Pedro Rivas said that this new service would allow them to give access to the crypto world to millions of Mexicans in a simple, safe, and educational way that would promote technological inclusion.
Latam expansion
The company had already given hints of making such a move. The head of Mercado Pago, Osvaldo Gimenez, first announced a potential expansion of its services on August 4th.
He highlighted the importance of crypto as an alternative investment in Latin America. The company had been the first one to have introduced this type of service in Brazil.
Since November 2021, it has been offering this functionality to more than 1 million customers in Brazil. But, it should be noted that customers are still not permitted to use crypto for buying merchandise in Mercado Libre.
Store of value
This is in accordance with the perception of crypto in the eyes of the chief executive and the co-founder of Mercado Libre, Marcos Galperin.
He believes that the functionality of crypto lies in being used as a store of value, rather than as a means of payment. The company also rolled out its own token on August 20th which it has named mercadocoin.
However, it did not give any hints about when and if the token would also be launched in Mexico. There has been growing interest in the crypto industry in Mexico.
A number of other companies have already added crypto as a payment method, as part of their business models.
These include a food delivery firm called Rappi, which announced on April 13th that it was launching a pilot program for accepting crypto payments for its services.
A Mexican senator called Indira Kempis also introduced a bill back in July that would grant bitcoin legal tender status in the country and improve the financial literacy and inclusion of its citizens.