On April 20th, the European Parliament passed the first comprehensive EU-wide crypto regulation, the Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA). On the same day, a separate law, the Money Transfer Ordinance, was passed, requiring crypto operators to confirm the identity of their customers in order to stop money laundering transactions.
As crypto regulation tightens around the world, Alchemy Pay is rapidly growing and rising in the cryptocurrency payments space as a payment solution provider that connects global fiat and cryptocurrencies for users in 173 countries. All of these achievements stemmed from a forward-thinking insight into the disruptive potential of crypto – the team believes that by creating a seamless gateway between traditional financial and crypto assets, they will make the emerging technology more widely available and provide easier access to financial services enable companies and individuals in different countries and regions.
At present, the company has established solid partnerships with international payment channels such as Visa, Mastercard, Discover, Diners Clubs, Google Pay, Apple Pay and hundreds of local payment channels, and is gradually expanding a larger partner network.
Recently, Shawn Shi, the founder of Alchemy Pay, was selected as one of the “Forbes China Web 3.0 Innovation Pioneers 2022”. At the same time, Alchemy Pay has established a brand benchmark for its professionalism, trustworthiness and accessibility as a professional and reputable payment solution provider, bridging the gap between fiat and cryptocurrencies in the global economy.
We have been committed to providing a mainstream-friendly crypto payment solution for five years
In 2017 the Alchemy Pay project was built and launched by a team of payment experts who have years of experience in Singapore, America and Europe at companies such as HSBC, Mastercard, Paypal and Visa. A year later, the Alchemy Pay team followed with Crypto Payment, the world’s first hybrid payment acceptance system for merchants, allowing merchants to accept payments from their customers in both cryptocurrencies and fiat currencies. “It’s the equivalent of a ‘hands-off’ system.” Robert McCracken, head of the Alchemy Pay ecosystem, explained: “We accept cryptocurrency payments on behalf of merchants and convert them to fiat currency to be redeemed in local fiat – to settle the merchant’s currency.”
From then on, the services provided by Alchemy Pay gradually expanded in four main directions, including on-ramp, off-ramp, NFT checkout, and cryptocurrency payment acceptance systems, bringing forth a diverse range of solutions while also showing some convergence and overlap between them remained four segments.
“On & Off-Ramp is our payment solution.” Robert explained in the interview: “On-Ramp is provided as a plugin that the Web3 platform can host on its website, allowing users to accept legal payment methods such as Visa, Mastercard, Apple Pay, Google Pay , local bank transfers and commonly used local digital wallets to buy cryptocurrencies securely. Off-Ramp is also a feature of the plugin that works in reverse and allows users to sell their cryptocurrency in fiat currency and have the funds transferred directly to their personal bank account, making it very simple, straightforward, secure and compliant for users Buy and sell cryptocurrency. The NFT checkout is a relatively new solution that allows for the easy purchase of NFT using fiat currency payment methods. This is an easier and less complicated way for both crypto-natives and users unfamiliar with Web3.”
Robert McCracken, head of the Alchemy Pay ecosystem
After more than five years of development, Alchemy Pay has accumulated more experience than any other project in the cryptocurrency payments industry – identifying the needs of cryptocurrency-native users, constantly updating and iterating the service, and developing solutions that have mainstream-friendly usability. Alchemy Pay is available almost everywhere in the world for people from different technical backgrounds, which has built up the platform’s barriers in crypto payments.
In the first years of its development, Alchemy Pay focused on the Asian market and gradually expanded to Europe and America. As of 2021, Alchemy Pay has established payment touchpoints with over 2 million merchants in over 70 countries worldwide. Over the past year, Alchemy Pay has focused its business on expanding its global network of payment and remittance partners, collaborating with more exchanges and mainstream blockchain networks, and evolving towards providing direct-to-customer (D2C) payment solutions.
Anchor your vision globally and anchor it locally
As the company continues to expand, Alchemy Pay has grown into a truly global organization. At the same time, the team found that establishing a strict hierarchical structure can hamper creativity and productivity and limit organizational growth.
For this reason, at the end of 2022, Alchemy Pay introduced an “Advisory Board Management System” that invites global experts to take over the management of different departments such as compliance, product, security, etc., where they can participate in the decision-making process. provide more professional advice and focus their talents on areas where they can unleash their true potential. “Since one person can’t handle everything, we implemented a board-based advisory and management system.” When asked about the original rationale for the system, Robert explained, “We thought a decentralized structure would allow our team to thrive and to grow healthy.” This setup was very successful and allowed for a real sense of team collaboration.”
David Plouffe, former senior White House adviser and legendary campaign manager, also recently joined Alchemy Pay and has served as a committee member on Alchemy Pay’s management and advisory board. He is a strategic advisor responsible for strategy, compliance and government relations worldwide. Plouffe is credited with the strategy and flair for grassroots public engagement that won Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign. After working for Obama, Plouffe became senior vice president of policy and strategy at Uber, and in 2022 Plouffe joined the Binance Global Advisory Board.
Alchemy Pay currently has core talent and experienced executives across all departments. Ethan Wang has been a driving force for the tech team, he is the lead tech on the Google Cloud Web3 team and one of the founding members of the team. He also previously worked as a technical lead and founding member for Facebook Libra. Andy Ng has over 20 years of product development experience; Jonas Cernius leads the compliance team from Europe as he has over 10 years of public service and financial compliance experience and extensive experience in the legal department. Robert said, “We welcome talented people from all over the world to join us and build Alchemy Pay with us!”
Robert McCracken, head of the Alchemy Pay ecosystem
By building a talented group with roots in the local market, Alchemy Pay puts more emphasis on local payments and makes it easier and faster for local users to use the payment services on offer. Alchemy Pay has a significant advantage in the local payment industry as it currently supports 300+ local payment channels such as OVO and DANA in Indonesia, GCash in the Philippines and many more. At the same time, this team model has allowed Alchemy Pay to gain an advantage in global policy and compliance: “Any change in the global regional regulatory environment is important to us and can lead to changes and trends in the payments space, and we will keep that.” Keep an eye on the latest trends and changes,” said Robert.
In recent years, Alchemy Pay has recognized the demand potential for cryptocurrencies in Southeast Asia and Latin America, adapted its payment solutions and focused its marketing efforts on these regions, and developed operational strategies to promote its products in line with local market conditions. Alchemy Pay has also built a strong reputation and product competitiveness by partnering with celebrities and well-known organizations to promote its payment products and build local brand presence.
“Our mission is to create a bridge between the fiat and crypto world economies.” Discussing Alchemy Pay’s long-term vision, Robert expressed the team’s desire to create a sustainable and evolutionary project that addresses the issues connecting the world of traditional finance with the world of cryptocurrencies.
He concluded Alchemy Pay’s mission and vision: “Our ultimate goal is to make it easier for people around the world to use and access a more decentralized, open and fair form of finance.” We want Alchemy Pay to be a crypto -Payment solution that works well and values user feedback. To achieve this, we will focus on evolving and improving our product while adopting a long-term mindset to meet the long-term needs of our users.”