Cryptocurrencies’ borderless nature, fast transaction speeds and lower costs have seen them emerge as a viable solution for businesses looking to both pay and get paid, especially when dealing with international clients and suppliers.
The advantages of using crypto for business-to-business (B2B) payments are clear — but even as the concept is becoming more mainstream, many organizations remain hesitant to adopt what they consider to be a nascent and fairly risky technology. Christophe Lassuyt, co-founder at Request Network, told PYMNTS that’s largely due to one thing: fear that stems from a lack of education.
“[Businesses] must overcome their fear of this new world where financial freedom and responsibility change the economy,” Lassuyt said. “To do so, they need to learn about the industry, understand how to start, be careful what information they trust and set up safety procedures from the beginning.”
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Learning something new takes time, but it could prove to be a worthwhile investment, as Lassuyt sees a lot of demand for crypto payments in the B2B world. While startups involved in the blockchain technology space have led the charge in cryptocurrency adoption, plenty of other organizations have come to realize the advantages of digital tokens for business payments.
Lassuyt, whose company has built an app for billing customers in crypto, said he has seen a lot of interest from what he calls “internationally remote companies,” which have found crypto to be an extremely useful tool for international transactions due to its speed and cost-effectiveness.
Lassuyt continued that crypto is far more convenient than cumbersome money transfers, which require that the recipient provide banking details, send an invoice and then wait days for their money to arrive. It also eliminates the need for currency conversion and the associated fees.
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“Any company that needs to pay a number of small payments internationally needs crypto to make things more efficient and simple,” Lassuyt said.
He added that many companies also see crypto as a sound investment. A growing number of executives prefer to keep their company’s funds stored in digital wallets where they can earn savings interest upwards of 10%, as opposed to keeping it in a bank account with close to zero interest.
Lassuyt conceded that the process of getting into crypto for business purposes is a little more challenging than doing so as an individual. The first step, he said, is to acquire some crypto, which means creating a custodial account on an exchange such as Coinbase.com or Kraken.com. After that, it’s easy to acquire crypto and start making payments.
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Lassuyt advises businesses to explore the emerging “Web3 universe” if they want to achieve true financial freedom and enjoy the full benefits of the crypto world. Web3 refers to a version of the internet that is decentralized and based on peer-to-peer technologies such as public blockchains.
The next step is to transition from a custodial wallet, such as Coinbase or Kraken, to a noncustodial wallet like Ledger, Treezor or Metamask. In a noncustodial wallet, the user has full custody of their funds and can interact with a new generation of decentralized finance apps, which makes it possible to invest, trade in crypto, stake tokens for rewards and more.
“From there, life is simple,” Lassuyt continued. “It’s financial freedom and financial inclusion. You can choose an app like Request Finance for your billing process, then select a multi-signature super-secure wallet such as Gnosis Safe and you’re good to go.”
Lassuyt noted that within the Web3 universe, the possibilities are almost limitless. There’s also a lot of functionality that simply isn’t possible with legacy payment tools – for example, noncustodial wallets can enable users to pay dozens of invoices in multiple cryptocurrencies with a single click.
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“Once companies understand that payment of 500 invoices to 45 countries in a single click is possible, they will happily invest some time to learn more,” Lassuyt said. “Companies need to adopt a learning approach, get in touch with the right services and ask for help to set things up.”
Lassuyt believes the adoption of crypto and Web3 for B2B payments is inevitable, given how 2021 has been a pivotal year, with companies like Elon Musk’s Tesla validating crypto through its acceptance of bitcoin.
Further, he cited the huge rewards for early adopters in the crypto space that are helping to accelerate acceptance. The Ethereum Name Service, which is a protocol for human-readable crypto addresses and decentralized domain names, provides rewards of $10,000 on average for its users, he said.
“This is why growth will happen faster than we imagine,” Lassuyt predicted. “I believe 2022 will mark the beginning of exponential adoption of crypto in B2B by the most innovative companies.”
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