Fit Pay, Cascade, Team Up to Enable Wearable-Based Cryptocurrency Payments in Stores

NXT-ID subsidiary Fit Pay has teamed up with Cascade FinTech to develop a platform for in-store cryptocurrency payments, the companies have announced.

Based in Las Vegas, the latter offers a digital development platform for fintech startups that is designed to offer APIs and other tools that are automatically KYC-, BSA-, and AML-compliant. It’s now going to work with Fit Pay, which offers its own payment platform for wearable devices, to develop a mobile wallet system that can automatically convert virtual currencies into more widely accepted payment methods at contactless points of sale. While the two companies have previously agreed to enable cloud-based FitPay transactions via Cascade Cloud, the new effort will see prepaid value stored on compatible wearable and IoT devices.

In a statement announcing the collaboration, Fit Pay President Michael Orlando pointed to the recent upwards trajectories of some big-name cryptocurrencies, asserting that “[a]s cryptocurrencies increase in value and distribution, the need to create new methods to monetize their value and enabling models for acceptance is the critical last mile.” Orlando added that enabling support for cryptocurrency payments would be “a natural extension of FitPay’s platform.”

News of the collaboration comes on the heels of Fit Pay’s announcement that ANZ, one of the biggest banks serving Australia and New Zealand, has offered support for its FitPay platform, suggesting that it is currently undergoing a growth phase propelled by enthusiasm for alternative and emerging payment methods.