PayPal's Cryptocurrency Partner Sees 500% Surge In Trading Volume In A Month

PayPal Holdings Inc PYPL cryptocurrency partner Paxos’s itBit exchange trading volume surged a whopping 500% to $26.57 million on Nov. 13 from $4.41 million a month ago, according to CoinGecko data.

What Happened: Meanwhile, 24-hour volume for Bitcoin stood at $31.59 billion on Friday.

The top BTC/USD exchanges Coinbase Pro and Kraken saw volumes of $104.97 million and $37.62 million, respectively, at press time, as per CoinMarketCap data, while, itBit’s 24-hour volume stood at $6.8 million — dropping in line with the wider market. The significant uptick in volume on the exchange follows its partnership with PayPal on the financial technology company's cryptocurrency foray.

Why It Matters: The Peter Thiel-co-founded PayPal began offering Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Bitcoin Cash (BCH), and Litecoin (LTC) access to its customers in late October.

This month PayPal said it would add cryptocurrency services to its Venmo app by the first half of 2021 and also allow international users to buy, sell, and hold cryptocurrency by the same time frame.

PayPal CEO Daniel Schulman said the move was “beginning of the opportunities” in relation to the company’s cryptocurrency foray and said it would work with regulators to “accept new forms of digital currencies.”

Price Action: PayPal shares closed 0.25% lower at $188.62 on Friday.

Photo courtesy: PayPal