Amazon Eyeing Mexico For ‘Digital Currency’ Payments Project

In an effort to enter emerging markets, Amazon Inc. appears to be readying to deploy a new payments system involving “Digital and Emerging Payments (DEP)”.

The project has yet to be officially announced, but Amazon has hinted at it across a series of recent job posts.

“We are looking for a leader to help us launch a new payment product stating with Mexico as our initial launch country. This product will enable customers to convert their cash in to digital currency using which customers can enjoy online services including shopping for goods and/or services like Prime Video.”

Not Using Bitcoin

The type of digital asset was not specified but it is highly unlikely that the retail giant will be using any of the public cryptos such as Bitcoin or Ethereum. It stated that applicants should be comfortable with designing new systems with appropriate technology and native AWS technologies.

Amazon’s DEP division intends to roll-out the product in Mexico first, however, a second job posting hinted that the product appears to be broadly aimed at emerging markets so further countries could follow.

Back in 2017, Amazon bought three crypto-related domains – amazoncryptocurrency.com, amazonethereum.com, and amazoncryptocurrencies.com, in addition to the amazonbitcoin.com that they already owned, according to CNBC. This fueled talk of the company’s potential interest in the space though nothing ever came of it.

In a recent post on Quora, Ripple’s chief technology officer David Schwartz aired doubts that the company will launch its own digital asset anytime soon or dabble in the current cryptocurrency market;

“Imagine if you had one currency that you were paid in, one currency that you had to pay taxes in, one currency that you used to pay your rent, one currency that you used to buy groceries, and so on. That would be a confusing mess. Not only would you incur lots of pointless fees converting between currencies, but you wouldn’t know what fraction of your salary you needed to pay your rent because the currencies could change value relative to each other.”

Amazon Coins

The firm does appear to have its own coins though that users can spend on apps, games, and in-app items. Amazon Coins come in denominations from 300 to 50,000 and bigger denominations always have bigger discounts. They are priced at $1 = 100 coins according to Amazon but have seldom been publicized or likened to cryptocurrencies.

The article was first published on: Feb 11, 2021