Why Litepay was an Epic Fail!

First off let me say that I love Litecoin and Charlie Lee’s vision for Litecoin. It is one of the true crypto currencies out there. A third party was developing a debit card that allowed you to spend your Litecoin wherever Visa is accepted. This could have been a major step towards the mass adoption of cryptocurrency. But unfortunately the creators of LitePay made promises they couldn’t fulfull.

True crypto currency lovers will say that you should be able to spend Litecoin with merchandisers directly and I couldn’t agree more. However, having a debit card that you can spend online and in a Brick and Mortar stores, was a huge step in the mainstream adoption of the crypto currency and the coin in general.

How did the creators of Litepay drop the ball? They waited until the day of the launch to email Litecoin users that they’re suspending signups for the debit card. What was the reason? It was due to the hostility of Visa and Mastercard .

Banks and credit card companies being hostile to crypto currencies aren’t something new. Litepay could have done the right thing though and let people who had signed up for the debit card know way in advance that they were delaying signups. They knew in advance that the launch wasn’t going to be possible at the target date. The project has been put off indefinitely.

To be clear this in no way reflects badly on Litecoin as a whole. The coin is still a great coin and a great project. The Litecoin foundation and LitePay are two separate entities. But this would have been a huge win for Litecoin. Hopefully when Coinbase comes out with their merchant processing product, it’ll get the bad taste of Litepay out of everyone’s mouth.