Binance and Mastercard will launch prepaid crypto cards in Argentina

Major crypto exchange Binance has partnered with Mastercard to launch a prepaid card for the residents of Argentina.

In a Thursday announcement, Binance said the card will allow its clients in Argentina to use Bitcoin (BTC), BNB and other cryptocurrencies to make purchases as well as ATM withdrawals in fiat wherever Mastercard is accepted — roughly 90 million merchants globally and online. Argentine cardholders can also earn up to 8% back in cryptocurrency from certain purchases.

According to Binance, the introduction of the card — expected to be “widely available in the coming weeks” — was part of the company’s efforts to further the global adoption of crypto. Residents of Argentina will be the first in the region to have access to the cards, but the crypto exchange announced a similar initiative for Binance users in Ukraine in April and for the European Economic Area in 2020.

“Payments is one of the first and most obvious use cases for crypto, yet adoption has a lot of room to grow,” said Maximiliano Hinz, general director of Binance in Latin America. “By using the Binance Card, merchants continue to receive fiat and the users pay in cryptocurrency they choose.”

Busy day. #Binance and Mastercardhttps://t.co/bGasmirwxD

— CZ Binance (@cz_binance) August 4, 2022

The card requires Argentines to have a valid national identity card or documento nacional de identidad. Similar requirements are already in place for credit cards issued by local crypto exchanges. In 2021, Lemon Card launched a card with Visa offering 2% back in BTC for Argentine users while Buenbit and Belo both partnered with Mastercard to release a prepaid card and a crypto rewards card, respectively.

Related: Argentina carries out crypto wallet seizures linked to tax delinquents

Despite the recent market downturn, reports suggest that many Argentines may still be turning to crypto. According to an Americas Market Intelligence report from April, researchers found that “crypto penetration” in Argentina had reached 12% — roughly double that of Peru and Mexico.