Legacy rails, new money: Visa and Mastercard just flipped the crypto playbook | Opinion

If you ever bought cryptocurrency in 2018, you remember the friction. KYC black holes, delayed bank transfers, and a random wallet address you hoped was correct. It’s easier now, but not by much. While the situation is certainly better these days, most of the friction and challenges remain — largely stemming from the traditional banking system. 

As a result, we find ourselves in a catch‑22: DeFi still depends on traditional infrastructure rails to scale, even as those same rails slow adoption. Rather than resisting this reality, the next phase of progress comes from leaning into those systems and upgrading them from within.

Ironically, the future of DeFi may depend on the very players it once sought to disrupt (Visa and Mastercard). What initially seemed like a detour is proving to be an advantage. By building on existing rails, we’re finding faster, more practical paths to real-world adoption than starting from scratch ever allowed.

The incompatibility between old and new

Despite serving the same function, DeFi and TradFi couldn’t be more different. On one side, you have a decentralized, 24/7, low-fee, user-centric paradigm of cryptocurrencies. On the other hand, there’s the centralized, often slow, high-fee, and risk-averse legacy structure of the traditional banking system. 

Merging the two results in a Frankenstein’s monster that relies on a centuries-old model to keep up with the demands of the digital age. It doesn’t operate around the clock for near-instant and global transactions (regardless of how you fund your account), incurs excessive and sometimes unreasonable fees through various charges, and delivers anything but a seamless user experience.

However, despite Visa and Mastercard seeming like the cause, they’re simply a manifestation of a deeper problem — outdated policies imposed by bureaucratic structures. Luckily, those policies are shifting. We’re seeing early moves that could reshape the landscape, like Visa settling stablecoins directly on-chain, and Mastercard launching crypto credential pilots. These are foundational shifts that could unlock real crypto spending at scale.

Reprogramming an outdated system

Despite the increasing adoption of crypto as an asset or investment, most users still struggle to use it as a means of exchange, something you can actually spend day to day. It doesn’t help that most businesses face hurdles in accepting crypto, unwilling or unable to adopt it due to perceived complexities, regulatory concerns, and a lack of understanding.

Forcing merchants to adapt for the convenience of a niche group of individuals is counterproductive, and so is the move toward crypto cards issued by Visa or Mastercard. If we want real adoption, we have to work with the system we have. Not because we agree with it. But because it’s already everywhere. And guess what? There are web3 projects out there that fully understand this. They are rolling out revolutionary solutions that don’t aim to rebuild from the ground up, but just take what works and make it crypto-friendly.

The best example of such an approach is virtual cards that bridge the existing infrastructure and the crypto by leveraging NFC to enable seamless transactions akin to Apple Pay without requiring a physical card. The concept is straightforward: users download an app, fund a dedicated crypto wallet, and then spend their digital assets at any store equipped with a standard Visa or Mastercard POS system. Merchants receive fiat currency while users pay with crypto, bypassing the usual card network intermediaries and their fees. All conversions happen instantly in the background, making crypto spending effortless.

True progress is quiet

The current status quo is personal. Years in fintech have shown me that while crypto holds revolutionary promise, the average user doesn’t want a revolution. They want to tap, pay, and move on. That’s what wins. Visa and Mastercard are now the unlikely partners making that possible.

Of course, this doesn’t mean all is solved. Traditional banking still imposes restrictions. Regulatory inertia still slows innovation. On top of everything, there are 1.4 billion unbanked people who deserve better. But if crypto is to become truly usable, it needs access to the rails that already move money today.

And in a space often defined by hype cycles and tribalism, that’s the kind of quiet, powerful progress we should be paying attention to. Crypto’s next leap won’t be a flashy headline. It’ll be a swipe, a tap, or a transaction powered by the very giants it once hoped to topple.

Amram Adar

Amram Adar, co‑founder and CEO of Oobit, a Tether‑backed crypto payments app enabling tap‑to‑pay stablecoin spending anywhere Visa or Mastercard is accepted. He’s focused on bridging the gap between crypto ownership and real‑world use.