What is the Gnosis Card ?

When you’ve been involved in cryptocurrency for a while, you start to compile a list of the most frequently asked questions people have when they're trying to understand how it all works.

One of the most common questions is:
 “Since cryptocurrencies are virtual, how can you actually spend them in the real world?”

To this question, there are two complementary answers:

Money is already virtual

First of all, here is the share of cash payments by European country in 2021. As you can see, in the vast majority of these countries, cash use is in the minority—most payments are already virtual.

Bank accounts, Apple/Google Pay accounts, PayPal accounts… the majority of our transactions are already digital by nature.

Ultimately, cryptocurrencies are no more "virtual" than the payment methods we already use. But that only answers half of the original question.

Spending your cryptocurrencies

The second part of the question was: “How can you actually spend them in the real world?”
And that raises an interesting issue:

There are already crypto-linked debit cards available (like Curve, Crypto.com, KuCard…). Some, like Curve and Crypto.com, have been functioning for several years now.

However, these solutions rely on centralized exchange platforms. This means we’re not really spending directly from our crypto wallets—and those platforms can freeze or seize our funds. In other words, we’re exposed to the same risks as with traditional banks.

For years, we had to settle for these kinds of solutions, because there was no payment card directly connected to a crypto wallet.

So yes, we can spend crypto in the real world—but until recently, we had to do it in a centralized way, which goes against the decentralized spirit of crypto.

Pay directly from your wallet with Gnosis Card

Gnosis Card is the first-ever payment card historically that connects directly to a wallet on the blockchain:

This has been made possible thanks to several different technologies & partners:

• Gnosis Pay, a decentralized payment network that can integrate with an existing payment processor.
• Monerium, a platform that allows you to convert your crypto to fiat and vice versa, as well as obtain an IBAN.
• Visa, the payment network integrated by Gnosis Pay.

When making a payment with the Gnosis Card, a smart contract withdraws funds from your wallet and sends them directly to the Visa payment network.

Thus, the payments we make with the Gnosis Card are not much different from payments with traditional bank cards, even though the funds come from our crypto wallet.

This solution is not perfect

For the Gnosis Card to truly compete with other payment solutions, there are still many improvements to be made:

• The card only works on the Gnosis Chain.
• You can only use EURe (a euro-backed stablecoin created by Monerium).
• You need to fund the payment account yourself.

But this is already a significant accomplishment by the Gnosis team. Until now, there was no practical way to spend self-hosted cryptocurrencies in the real world, and the Gnosis Card is the first solution to make this possible.

No matter what happens in the years ahead, this is yet another proof that the barrier between blockchain and the real world is disappearing.

This article was written by Stengarl.