Online Retail Giant Rakuten Allows People to Load Payment App With Cryptocurrencies

The firm Rakuten Inc., often referred to as “the Amazon of Japan,” announced customers can now load up Rakuten Pay accounts with cryptocurrencies like bitcoin, ethereum, and bitcoin cash. In order to commemorate the latest crypto service, Rakuten is also offering bonus points to people leveraging “Rakuten Cash” via crypto assets.

Crypto Can Pay for Rakuten Goods and Services, Alongside Mister Donut, Familymart, and McDonald’s

The massive Japanese electronic commerce and online retail company based in Tokyo is now allowing crypto users to leverage the company’s Rakuten Pay service in order to load up on Rakuten Cash. The payment service with crypto asset support provides clients with access to a wide range of Rakuten’s services and products including the firm’s travel services, Kobo e-books, and mobile.

Moreover, users can load their Rakuten app with BCH, BTC, or ETH in order to purchase items at Familymart, McDonald’s, 7-11, and Mister Donut to name a few. Digital currency proponents, particularly from Japan, we’re extremely happy about Rakuten’s new crypto support.

“This news is huge for Japan,” explained one individual on Twitter. “You can now pay at McDonald’s and 711 and perhaps hundreds of thousands of other stores with Crypto.”

Rakuten’s announcement details that crypto users can also top up funds with digital assets via their Rakuten Cash-buying function. However, users need to also leverage Rakuten’s crypto wallet in order to access Rakuten Cash via digital currencies. Moreover, the company is offering a bonus point gift to customers using the Rakuten Cash-buying function with cryptocurrencies.

Rakuten Group Wants to Provide Convenient Crypto Asset Management

The press release also notes that there is a minimum charge amount of 1,000 yen ($10) and a one-time upper limit at around 100,000 yen ($1,000) per month. The loads can be done 24 hours a day and seven days a week via the Rakuten Pay app and the company’s crypto wallet. There is no fee for conversion, but “it is necessary to open a physical trading account using the Rakuten Wallet and install a smartphone app dedicated to trading,” Rakuten says.

The Tokyo-based firm further adds:

[The company] will utilize the synergies of the Rakuten Group to provide convenient and profitable cryptocurrency asset management and new usage methods to improve customer satisfaction.

Rakuten Group has been into crypto solutions and blockchain technology for quite some time, as it launched the Rakuten Blockchain Lab (RBL) in Belfast, UK, back in 2016. Then in 2018, the company acquired the crypto exchange project “Everybody’s Bitcoin Inc.” for 256 million yen (~US$2,305,484). On August 19, 2019, Rakuten continued to move forward and launched its crypto exchange.

“Through the smartphone app, customers can make transactions for crypto asset trading accounts, such as depositing/withdrawing Japanese yen and depositing/withdrawing crypto assets, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year,” the Japanese company said at the time.

The latest Rakuten crypto support that allows people to pay for goods and services with ETH, BTC, and BCH, is another forward move for Rakuten in the crypto industry since jumping in back in 2014.

What do you think about Rakuten’s latest announcement about crypto support for Rakuten Pay and Rakuten Cash? Let us know what you think about this subject in the comments section below.