Cryptocurrencies Need To Be Used For Payments In Order To Grow, Says PayPal CTO

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PayPal CTO, Sri Shivananda, believes that cryptocurrencies still have a long way to go in terms of mass adoption. While endorsing India’s digital asset ban removal, he noted that most consumers view them as assets instead of applicable currencies for actual payments.

Crypto Needs More Use-Cases

Sri Shivananda, the CTO of PayPal – one of the world’s largest online payment companies – recently spoke at the recent Economic Times Global Business Summit. Amongst other financial topics, he also offered his views on the state of cryptocurrencies.

According to Shivananda, people need to begin using digital assets for payments, instead of focusing on their asset value.

    “What’s happened with crypto is many cases it’s become a little more of an asset play than a currency. The main thing to keep in mind is this business is to follow consumers. If consumers start to feel like there’s some leverage that they get through cryptocurrencies, everything else will automatically fall in line.”

Shivananda also outlined that the digitalization of currencies is only a matter of time with the constant growth of the internet. When all participants, including consumers, merchants, regulators, governments, and fintech companies, understand the merits and the need, then digital assets will play a vital role, he stated.

Sri Shivananda, Paypal CTO. Image by: CNBC

The Paypal CTO also spoke on the latest cryptocurrency-related news coming from his home country, India. As CryptoPotato reported last week, India’s Supreme Court had lifted a two-year-old ban by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on digital asset trading. Even though the RBI is reportedly planning to retaliate, PayPal CTO believes that this is a step in the right direction.

The Reasons Why PayPal Left Libra

When Facebook announced its future cryptocurrency project Libra, it began with 23 world-class companies as partners. Some of those names included Uber, MasterCard, Visa, Spotify, and, interestingly, PayPal.

World regulators quickly started clamping down on the project, and some of them ultimately abandoned it. PayPal was among those who left, claiming, at the time, that they want to work on their core business.

Shivananda also touched upon PayPal’s departure, but he pointed out a slightly different reason. He said that when initially got on-board, the idea was to help the “under-served, the people that are not supported by the system today.” However, he continued that shortly after it “felt like that was not going to be the case, in the short to medium term.”

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