Latin American payment service provider, Mercado Pago, now enables customers to buy and sell the Meli Dollar stablecoin through its app to all users in Brazil.
The Meli Dollar stablecoin is pegged one-to-one with the US dollar and looks to ensure users have access to options less volatile than existing cryptocurrencies. Mercado Pago hopes the move will help democratise access to financial services and offer a practical and stable option for financial management for Brazilians.
“The Meli Dollar joins a suite of open solutions, which has a unique ability to scale financial products and services for everyone,” said André Chaves, SVP of Mercado Pago. “Attentive to the evolution of cryptoassets, Mercado Pago continues to offer solutions to democratise access to the crypto universe and promote innovation and financial development for users.”
In this initial phase, customers can buy and sell Meli Dollar through its app, protecting themselves from exchange rate fluctuations in an accessible and reliable way. As a special feature of the launch, the Mercado Pago app will not charge any fees for facilitating buy and sale operations, and the purchase of Meli Dollar through the app will be enabled from the user’s Mercado Pago account balance in Brazilian real.
Protecting users’ purchasing power
Ripio, one of the largest cryptoasset platforms in Latin America, will act as the market maker and exchanger for transactions made using Mercado Pago’s app. The two entities began their partnership last year.
Sebastian Serrano, co-founder and CEO of Ripio, also explained: “Collaborating on the realisation of Meli Dollar brings great satisfaction to Ripio, which has been leading the crypto industry in Latin America for over a decade.
“We are excited to contribute to a safe and accessible solution for Mercado Pago’s users in Brazil, who, among other things, want to protect their purchasing power in a time of economic volatility. As the exchange and custodian of these operations, Ripio plays an important role in ensuring the security and efficiency of this stablecoin, strengthening users’ trust in the digital environment.”
Meli Uruguay SRL, a company within the Mercado Libre group, will issue the Meli Dollar.