Fireblocks, a digital assets management platform, has introduced a grant program worth $1 million for companies that are developing blockchain-based projects using the PayPal USD (PYUSD) stablecoin. The program offers grants of up to $60,000 to qualifying projects, and it was extended on October 24th following a beta period involving payment firms KoraPay and Bridge.
Ran Goldi, the Senior Vice President of Payments and Networks at Fireblocks, expressed excitement about the potential impact of PYUSD, stating, “Our pilot has already shown the transformative impact PYUSD can have, and we look forward to seeing businesses create real-world use cases that take advantage of what stablecoins can offer.”
Fireblocks is a custody platform for digital assets that utilizes multiparty computation (MPC) security technology for blockchain applications. By holding PYUSD, developers can leverage Fireblocks’ network suite to enable secure blockchain-based payment services. The combination of Fireblocks’ MPC tech and the immutability of blockchain as a digital ledger may particularly appeal to security-conscious fintech companies.
The integration of PayPal’s PYUSD stablecoin, which is a type of cryptocurrency backed by a fiat reserve and issued by Paxos, allows developers to combine stablecoin currency payments with Fireblocks’ security features to create end-to-end blockchain payment applications. Jose Fernandez da Ponte, the Senior Vice President of Blockchain, Cryptocurrency, and Digital Currencies at PayPal, considers stablecoins like PYUSD to be the “killer app for crypto when it comes to payments.”
Tether’s USDT stablecoin recently achieved a record high on October 20th, surpassing a market capitalization of $120 billion. As of October 24th, it remains close to this milestone. PYUSD, on the other hand, is the sixth largest stablecoin by market capitalization, currently valued at $654 million.