Revolut, a UK-based FinTech startup, has announced that it has added support for two additional popular cryptocurrencies — Bitcoin Cash (BCH) and Ripple (XRP) — to its mobile banking app (for iPhone and Android).
Revolut, which was founded by Nikolay Storonsky, and Vlad Yatsenko in July 2015 in London, started life as a FinTech company by offering a multi-currency pre-paid debit card managed via a mobile app. Since then, it has expanded its range of services to include cross-border money transfers at Interbank FX rates, free global ATM withdrawals, personal loans, travel insurance, and (most interestingly, from our point of view) cryptocurrency trading.
Late last year, Revolut launched a service called “Revolut Crypto” designed to provide a simple way for its customers — even those with very little previous knowledge of cryptocurrencies — to buy, hold, or sell Bitcoin (BTC), Litecoin (LTC), and Ether (ETH) in a very simple way. Their blog post on the subject promised:
“No exchanges. No private keys. No cold storage. Just tap a button and get immediate exposure to Bitcoin, Litecoin and Ether.”
There was (and there still is) one serious limitation that makes this service not really suitable for “serious traders”: the app does not allow “transfers to external wallets” or “customers to transfer their existing crypto to the app.” Here is what Revolut has to say about this limitation:
“Unfortunately, we’re not able to support external transfers right now due to strict regulation. We totally appreciate that this may be a deal breaker for some people, but we are not ruling out this option for the future.”
When we last wrote about Revolut on 30 April 2018, Revolut had promised on Twitter to add support for Bitcoin Cash (BCH) and Ripple (XRP) within two weeks. Well, the good news is that, although roughly one week late, support for BCH and XRP — two of the cryptocurencies most often requested by their users since the launch of Revolut Crypto — is finally here. What this means is users can now instantly exchange any of 25 supported fiat currencies directly into BTC, LTC, ETH, XRP and BCH.
There are two ways to get access to the “Revolut Crypto” feature in Revolut’s mobile app. You can either get three other people to open an account with Revolut or you can pay for the “Revolut Premium” service (which in the UK costs GBP 6.99 per month).
Finally, it is important that if you are already a Revolut user, you MUST update the mobile app via the iOS App Store or the Google Play Store; otherwise, BCH and XRP won’t show up in the list of cryptocurrencies that you can buy/sell.
