There is poetry in the symmetry of this situation. Bitfinex is looking to raise $1 billion in capital to support the most popular stablecoin Tether, which it controls. Facebook is reportedly looking to raise $1 billion in capital from First Data, Visa and Mastercard and other payments companies to shore up its own stablecoin asset. Poetry is where the similarities end, and all these devils are in the details.
According to Visa 96 percent of U.S. payment volume took place on chip cards, with the large majority being chip and signature cards; starting next month major card brands will look to move customers to the chip and PIN cards that have been widely adopted across Europe; Merchants will be able to turn cell phones into terminals instead of buying expensive POS terminals with pin pads; wide adoption will take time as smaller retailers might not see the benefits as quickly and large retailers have invested a lot in the current technology. Source.
