Bitreserve Revamps Itself and Becomes Uphold, Starts Offering Fiat Money Services
Bitcoin exchange Bitreserve, Inc has undergone a major rebranding and repositioning to unveil itself as Uphold, Inc.
In addition to the company’s original service wherein customers’ bitcoin could be converted into legacy currencies and metals, customers will now have the means to link their bank accounts to fund their Uphold accounts. Credit cards and debit cards will also be accepted, along with Bitcoin.
In a blog post , CEO Anthony Watson spoke about the rebranding of the name along with the changes to the company’s platform.
In a word, Uphold embodies our core values and is the best way we can describe our bold vision of providing accessible, equitable, free and fair financial services to everyone, everywhere – secure in the cloud, real-time on any device.
As of today, Uphold users in 33 European countries can fund their accounts via bank transfer, in addition to bitcoin. Also, users in 30 European countries can fund their Uphold accounts via credit
or debit cards, as well as bitcoin.
Come November, members of Uphold in the U.S. and China will also have access to the new features and so too will members in India in January 2016.
Uphold also plans to release physical and virtual payment cards with Visa and Mastercard for Uphold members to pay merchants (online and in-store), from their Uphold accounts directly.
Speaking to The Epoch Times, Uphold (formerly Bitreserve) founder Halsey Minor spoke about bitcoin and using the idea behind the cryptocurrency to other legacy currencies.
“Bitcoin came along and I never saw Bitcoin as the new global currency. But what if this concept of digital money, if we applied it to dollars and euros and yuan and yen and pounds and now 24 other currencies? What if all those currencies could be exchanged in the cloud, instantly, at no cost.”
Bitreserve’s management has previously been vocal in having doubts with the “long term sustainability of bitcoin as a currency.”
With the foray into embracing the banking system, there will now be charges for customers depositing money through, for instance, a credit card at a 2.75 percent fee.
Also, there will be a 0.5 percent charge for withdrawals beyond 60 BTC, €10,500, £8,000 or $12000 USD a year.
Also, Uphold will be giving 5% of its pre-tax profits to charities in addition to complete free transactions sans any charges for registered charities.
In another excerpt from the blog, Watson says:
Uphold now connects the world’s legacy and fragmented financial systems, networks and services with our vision for the future of money and finance. We call it “The Internet of Money™.
He added: “Our members are no longer constrained to just only using bitcoin.”
Images from Uphold and Shutterstock.
