Visa survey: 25% of small businesses plan to accept crypto payments in 2022

According to a survey of the payment giant Visa, almost 25% of small business owners across 9 countries, including Brazil, Singapore, UAE, and Hong Kong, said they intend to embrace digital currencies as a form of payment in 2022. Also, 13% of consumers in these countries predicted retail stores will begin allowing crypto settlements in the next 12 months.

As Reuters reported, Visa surveyed 2,250 small business owners from nine countries across the globe, including the United States of America, Canada, Brazil, and Singapore. Per the results, every fourth participant plans to embrace bitcoin or some alternative coins as a payment method before the end of the ongoing year.

Small businesses outside North America are more open to accepting digital currencies, including Bitcoin, as forms of payment.  ​For example, Visa estimated that over 30% of the small business merchants based in the United Arab Emirates, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Brazil intend to enable cryptocurrency options to clients in the coming months. In contrast, 19% of those in the USA and just 8% in Canada plan to do the same.

The payment processing organization also interviewed 1,000 American adults who are not in charge of companies, along with 500 more people from each other country. Nearly 13% of those 1,500 individuals anticipate retail stores to begin offering digital asset payments in 2022.

Visa’s Global Head of merchant sales and acquiring, Jeni Mundy, said many owners of businesses worldwide view the embracement of new forms of payments as “fundamental” to their companies’ growth. She added that accepting cryptocurrencies also come as a “natural evolution” for many smaller firms.

It is safe to say that cryptocurrency adoption flourished in the past 12 months as numerous giant companies allowed customers to pay with digital assets, should they be willing to do so. Such examples include Croatia’s and Mexico’s largest supermarket chains – Konzum and Elektra.

Last year, even the major electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla started accepting Bitcoin payments for its cars. However, the company halted the initiative a few months later due to environmental concerns.

Arguably the most significant example of such adoption in 2021 was El Salvador’s decision to recognize Bitcoin as legal tender inside its borders officially.

In December, Visa launched crypto advisory services. Moreover, Visa’s head of crypto recently revealed that the company has partnered with 60 cryptocurrency platforms to let consumers spend digital currency at 80 million merchants worldwide.