In a Q4 2020 investor update, PayPal revealed that it recorded fourth-quarter and fiscal year financial results that were far beyond its expectations. The company noted that it was its strongest fiscal year, with high payment volume and new accounts further strengthening its scale.
PayPal recorded a massive surge in the number of active accounts on its platform, with a whopping 16 million active accounts in Q4 2020 alone. For fiscal 2020, the company added 72.7 million net new active accounts, bringing its total active accounts to 377 million.
This increase came shortly after the company introduced cryptocurrency trading on its platform. On October 21, 2020, PayPal confirmed its entry into the market after it had received a conditional license from the New York State Department of Financial Services (NYDFS), which allows US users of its Venmo service to trade cryptocurrencies.
PayPal’s Crypto Users Are Very Active
PayPal admitted that activity on its network went high after it allowed clients to buy, sell, and store cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin, and Bitcoin Cash using its wallets.
Consequently, clients who engaged in crypto trading started spending more than twice the time they spent before using the service.
PayPal noted that its total payment volume for the final three months of 2020 rose by 39% to $277 billion, exceeding the company’s expectations and the $267 billion predictions of analysts for the fourth quarter of 2020.
Shaping Crypto In Consumer Payments
Speaking of the company’s venture into cryptocurrencies on a call with analysts, PayPal’s CEO, Dan Schulman said that the company has formulated a comprehensive product technique regarding crypto, blockchain technology, and digital currencies in general.
He noted that PayPal is “significantly investing” in their new crypto and blockchain business unit. The company plans to help shape the role of cryptocurrencies in consumer payments across the globe.
Schulman said:
We also saw an exceptional response from our crypto launch, even with high initial expectations the volume of crypto traded on our platform greatly exceeded our projections. We are excited to build upon this early success by allowing customers to use their crypto balance as a funding source whenever they shop at our 29 million merchants. We anticipate the rollout of that capability to begin late this quarter, and we hope to launch our first international market in the next several months. These initial steps are just the beginning of an extensive road map around crypto, blockchain, and digital currencies.
