The stablecoin company Tether and the video platform Rumble launched a non-custodial crypto wallet on Wednesday, allowing users to send tips to Rumble content creators in digital currencies.
The wallet will initially support Tether's dollar-pegged stablecoin, USDt (USDT), Tether Gold (XAUt), a commodity tokenized product, and Bitcoin (BTC), according to a Rumble announcement.
MoonPay will provide fiat on-ramps and off-ramps for Rumble wallet users, enabling them to convert crypto into local currencies.
Tether and Rumble initially planned the wallet launch for December, once code bugs and user experience issues were resolved.
Cointelegraph contacted Rumble and Tether, but had not yet received a response at the time of publication.
The integration of crypto tips on Rumble promotes the use of crypto as a medium of exchange rather than use cases such as market speculation or store of value, which dominate Bitcoin (BTC) and cryptocurrencies in general.
Crypto is emerging as the future of native internet value transfer, but challenges remain
"Crypto-powered peer-to-peer payments are the future of internet economy," said Ivan Soto-Wright, CEO of the crypto payments company MoonPay.
Bitcoin, the world's first cryptocurrency, was designed as a peer-to-peer electronic cash system, according to the Bitcoin whitepaper published by the anonymous developer Satoshi Nakamoto.
However, low transaction capacity, with blocks being formed every approximately 10 minutes and relatively high transaction fees, has prevented it from being widely used as a payment method, especially for smaller purchases, where the transaction fee exceeds the price of the good or service.
Currently, the primary use of Bitcoin is as a store of value or speculative instrument, with most users accumulating BTC and holding it long-term for price appreciation, rather than spending it on commercial transactions.
Differences between inflationary and deflationary cryptocurrencies. Source: Cointelegraph
Stablecoins, which are blockchain tokens backed by assets such as fiat currencies or sovereign debt instruments, have addressed this issue by offering near-instant settlement times and relatively low transaction fees, enabling value to move across the internet through blockchain infrastructures.
Despite the innovation in near-instant and cross-border value transfer, critics say stablecoins still suffer from inflation of the underlying fiat currency, centralization, and the risk of confiscation.