Coinbase Says Middlemen Charging Small Businesses Too Many Fees Amid Launch of New Initiative

Leading US-based crypto exchange Coinbase has launched a new initiative aimed at introducing crypto as an alternative payment system for small businesses.

In a statement, Coinbase says it is teaming up with the pizza-ordering platform Slice for a special sweepstakes that’s designed to put money back into the hands of small businesses.

The initiative, which runs through June, offers consumers the chance to win 1 Bitcoin (BTC) each for them and the pizzeria when they order pizza from a participating shop and scan the QR code on the box.

Says Coinbase,

“Small businesses like pizzerias anchor our communities. Yet high transaction fees and long processing times often make it hard to stay afloat.”

The exchange launched the initiative following research that found middlemen such as legacy financial institutions and payment apps keep the system expensive, difficult to access and mired with delays.

“Users of the system, both consumers and small businesses alike, must pay, then wait, and then pay again as their money wends its way past intermediaries who add fees and time to the process.”

Coinbase says that in 2022, merchants spent more than $126 billion on fees to process credit card transactions, which could have been reduced to almost zero had they used blockchain technology.

The exchange says consumers could have also saved around $600 per household with crypto.

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