Western Union Isn’t Adding Crypto Transfers Any Time Soon
Western Union (WU), an American person-to-person money transfer company, won’t be adding any cryptocurrency transfers to its solutions any time soon, the company CEO confirmed. This Wednesday morning, during the Economic Club of New York, Western Union CEO Hikmet Ersek said WU won’t be joining the crypto craze until these currencies become more widely used.
“The consumers tell us what they want. People aren’t paying their hospital bills in cryptos,“ Ersek said, according to Marketwatch.
He also said crypto still has a long way to go, because governments will not cede such power to the people over night. Discussing the issue, he said that “nations are built on flags, constitutions, borders and currencies,” and there’s no central bank home to a reserve currency that is just going to give up such control.
On the other hand, cryptocurrencies’ advocates are saying their biggest advantage lies exactly in the fact that it doesn’t have a central bank, or a government, for control.
This is not the first time Western Union is being linked to cryptocurrencies. Previously, the company’s CEO confirmed WU was experimenting with Ripple’s XRP. Ersek is saying Western Union is still experimenting with Ripple’s xRapid product, but it has not managed to save money so far.
“We are always criticized that Western Union is not cost-efficient, blah blah blah, but we did not see that part of the efficiency yet during our tests,” Ersek told Fortune. He added that Western Union would be adding XRP only if it can prove to lower their costs. XRP is the third biggest cryptocurrency by market cap, and its use revolves around facilitating cross-border money transfer.
