PayPal announced today that its U.S. dollar-pegged stablecoin, PayPal USD (PYUSD), is now available on the Solana blockchain. This move follows its initial launch on Ethereum in 2023.
In their Wednesday announcement, PayPal highlighted the ”significant benefits for commerce use cases” that the expansion to Solana will bring.
Solana, known for being the blockchain behind SOL, the fifth largest cryptocurrency by market cap, aims to rival Ethereum by offering a faster and more efficient network for developers to create applications ranging from games to decentralized finance (DeFi) apps.
Solana’s speed and low transaction costs make it an attractive option, which PayPal emphasized in their statement. ”As the most used blockchain for stablecoin transfers, according to data from blockchain analytics platform Artemis, Solana has emerged as the leading blockchain to run tokenized transactions and is ideal for PYUSD as it continues to be used for payment use cases,” the announcement noted.
Jose Fernandez da Ponte, PayPal’s senior vice president of blockchain, crypto, and digital currency, stated, ”Making PYUSD available on the Solana blockchain furthers our goal of enabling a digital currency with a stable value designed for commerce and payments.”
PYUSD, backed by cash equivalents and short-term treasuries, was launched by PayPal last year and is issued by Paxos Trust Co. Initially running on Ethereum, PYUSD offers a stable digital asset that avoids the price volatility common to cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin.
The stablecoin is already available on major exchanges including Crypto.com, Coinbase, and Kraken.
Featured image from: unlockblockchain.com